Clearwater Analytics - Q3 2023
November 1, 2023
Transcript
Operator (participant)
Thank you all for joining, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you all for standing by, and welcome to the Clearwater Analytics Third Quarter 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. My name is Brika, and I'll be your event specialist running today's call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question at this time, please press star, then one on your touch-tone keypad. If you change your mind at any time and would like to remove your request to speak, then please press star, then two. Thank you, and I would now like to welcome Joon Park, Head of Investor Relations, to begin today's conference.
Joon Park (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, and welcome everyone to Clearwater Analytics Third Quarter 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. Joining me on the call today are Sandeep Sahai, Chief Executive Officer, and Jim Cox, Chief Financial Officer. After their remarks, we will open the call to a question-and-answer session. I would like to remind all participants that during this conference call, any forward-looking statements are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Expressions of future goals, intentions, and expectations, including in relation to business outlook, future financial and product performance, and similar items, including without limitation, expressions using the terminology may, will, can, expect, and believe, and expressions which reflect something other than historical facts are intended to identify forward-looking statements.
Forward-looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties, including those discussed in the risk factor section of our filings with the SEC. Actual results may differ materially from any forward-looking statements. The company undertakes no obligation to revise or update any forward-looking statements in order to reflect the events that may arise after this conference call, except as required by law. For more information, please refer to the cautionary statement included in our earnings press release. Lastly, all metrics discussed on this call are presented on a non-GAAP or adjusted basis and include the results of JUMP Technology since the acquisition on November 30th, 2022, unless otherwise noted. A reconciliation to GAAP results can be found in the earnings press release that we have posted to our investor relations website.
With that, I'll turn the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Sandeep Sahai.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thanks, Joon, and thank you all for joining us. The very strong numbers in Q3 were a result of disciplined execution from our operations and onboarding teams, strong and sustained product innovation from our engineering and product teams, and finally, our ability to focus on client success with a genuine desire to partner for the long term. Normally, I would provide a business summary in this opening section of the call, but given the financial outperformance in Q3, I've asked our Chief Financial Officer, Jim Cox, to discuss the financials first.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Thanks, Sandeep, and thank you all for joining us. Sandeep is right. We had another strong quarter. On the heels of Q2's solid results and our impactful first Investor Day in September, I'm happy to report strong results for Q3, where we beat guidance on top and bottom line once again. Revenue continued to re-accelerate, but the real highlight is our greater than 30% EBITDA margin for Q3. At our Investor Day, we announced our intent to expand EBITDA margins by 200 basis points in 2024 to approximately 29%. After our strong Q3 results, our current 2023 guidance implies full-year EBITDA margins increasing to approximately 28%. Today, we intend to expand EBITDA margin by 200 basis points in 2024, so we expect our 2024 EBITDA margin will be approximately 30%.
In effect, we believe these higher profitability levels will persist in the business going forward. Turning to revenue in the quarter. In Q3, 2023, we delivered $94.7 million in revenue, which translates to 23.7% year-over-year revenue growth, driven by marquee client wins, displacing our legacy competitors, continued expansion at our existing clients, and continued increase in efficiency of onboarding new clients by our operations team. In addition, clients continue to remain with us with a strong and consistent 98% gross retention. We've achieved this 98% gross retention for 18 out of the last 19 prior quarters. Our net revenue retention rate continued to remain healthy at 108% as of September 30, 2023, which is higher than the prior year's 103.
We continue to aspire to expand NRR to 115% or beyond through upsell of new products and modules that we are now offering our clients, like Clearwater LPx, MLx, Prism, and our JUMP solutions. We expect our improved GTM and additional products to help us meet our goals. As we saw during our recent Clearwater Connect, our clients are excited about our new offerings that we continue to develop to meet their dynamic needs in an ever-changing investment world. Now let's turn to profitability results. We are pleased to report that both our EBITDA margin and gross margin showed strong improvement in Q3. We reported $28.6 million in adjusted EBITDA and 30.2% EBITDA margin in the third quarter, which was 550 basis points higher than the third quarter of last year.
Just like last quarter, the outperformance in our revenue flowed straight through to EBITDA, as we are starting to see real efficiency gains with the operations team using our GenAI technology. Yet another highlight of the quarter was our free cash flow at $30.9 million. Free cash flow exceeded EBITDA in the quarter as there were limited changes in working capital and increased interest income contributed to our cash flows. Put this all together, and we ended the quarter with $302.8 million in cash, cash equivalents, and investments, our highest ever balance. This level of cash on the balance sheet and the free cash flow generation of this business provides us with significant strategic optionality in a number of areas. Overall, the third quarter was exceptionally strong, continuing our positive momentum.
We could not deliver these results without the great work of our over 1,700 employees, who are tirelessly focused on delivering for our clients. Certainly, we could not achieve these results without partnering with our terrific clients. With that, I'll turn it over to Sandeep to share the exceptional client details that generated these stellar results.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thank you, Jim. I wanted to cover the three topics I laid out at the beginning of my remarks, namely disciplined execution, client success, and product innovation. Disciplined execution and a focus on client success are very important to our business. At the highest level, we are excited to be executing ahead of the models we presented on Investor Day, and these results were delivered before the R&D cost starts to normalize. The entire Clearwater team continues to be relentless in the urgency and precision with which it executes. The commercial model adjustment of last year, the highest ever NPS in the company's history this past quarter, and the sharp improvement in the time taken to onboard clients are examples of our ability to execute.
It's easy for us to say that 90% of the onboarding now happens within five months, but that is a truly extraordinary achievement.
The reality is that systems like these can take several years to implement, and the fact that we get customers on our platform live within five months is a direct consequence of a single-instance multi-tenant platform, a single security master, and the relentless focus of our onboarding team, which leads me to product innovation. The needs of the industries we serve continue to change and will continue to change in the future. It's our ability to adjust, execute, and innovate that allows us to deliver these results. The needs of the asset management industry continue to evolve, and they now face relentless cost and growth pressures. Recognizing this change, we started to invest in Prism, and our current solution makes us a partner for growth instead of a partner who could just replace their accounting platform.
In many deals in recent quarters, we are now helping our asset management clients deliver a better solution to their clients, thereby helping them increase AUM flows, we have become a partner for growth. Likewise, the asset owner industry also evolved their investing strategy and increased their allocation to alternative assets. While we already process alternative assets very well, two years back, we started to invest with the goal of becoming best-in-class when it comes to reporting on constituent elements within an LP, spanning data lineage, compliance, and reporting requirements. We now have Clearwater LPx, LPx Clarity, and MLx. These products play a significant role in our ability to continue to win and differentiate our solutions.
We are very proud of our ability to win 80% of the time we write a proposal. We maintain that win rate by continuously listening to our clients and prospects.
We believe that we have a truly disruptive platform, but we will continue to innovate to ensure that we broaden our competitive moat. How do we do this? We evaluate product ideas and categorize them into one of three areas. First, Back to Base. Products that can help our current clients get better value or help us to solve additional pain points. Second, adjacencies. Products that can help us provide a full investment lifecycle solution for investment management instead of just investment accounting. Third, disruptors. Leveraging the power of the single instance platform, these are products that help us leverage the power of the Single Security Master and have the potential to disrupt the industry. We then weigh the investment against booking potential, both over the next 12 months and in the long term.
We take a portfolio approach that includes hitting singles and doubles, while also reserving some investment for potential home runs. One key tenet of our innovation process that is common to all our ideas, is partnering with actual clients every step of the way. We solicit client inputs directly through our customer advisory boards and through our annual user conference, Clearwater Connect. Speaking of Connect, in September, we hosted over 500 clients and prospects from across the globe to discuss our innovation roadmap, take their feedback, and conduct joint design sessions. We held over 160 client meetings. We actively sought inputs to our roadmap and received feedback from them on our upcoming initiatives. Most importantly, we collaborated with design partners to ensure that our products are immediately beneficial to them.
Let me try and bring these trends to life with actual seven-figure client wins this quarter.
I'll start with a leading insurance company that we won in Q3. This was a significant win because they had outsourced their entire investment accounting function to a competitor. But when they saw an on-site demo of the Clearwater platform, they realized that it was possible to get a comprehensive daily view of their global portfolio, including public and private assets, which in turn would enable their decision-makers to make better and more informed decisions. That demo led to an accelerated review of the accounting book of record solutions, and this insurer selected Clearwater in record time. Another large win was with a leading life insurance and annuity company that administers nearly $100 billion in assets under management. They selected a competitor over two years back, and they have yet to go live.
Meanwhile, they bought another pool of assets, but given the challenges the parent company was facing, this subsidiary chose Clearwater. Clearwater was able to swiftly implement the subsidiary assets, and they went live on our platform in relatively short order. Looking at that experience, we are joyous to report that the parent company came to the conclusion that the prior system they selected was unable to scale and operate under pressure, and opted to consolidate all their assets onto Clearwater's platform. Today, Clearwater is their sole investment accounting solution, and we once again proved the power of our platform. In Q3, we also signed an asset manager who had previously decided to migrate to the cloud version of a competitor's offering. As they attempted to move from an on-prem to the cloud version with this vendor, the complaints covered the gamut.
From inaccurate data and segregated teams for asset classes, to reporting limitations and the overall inexperience of the provider. They found themselves consistently late on monthly close, unable to provide users with a view into the daily holdings across all assets, all while their fees crept up.... Clearwater took a different approach. We started by collaborating. We conducted a number of in-person sessions outlining every asset class, illustrated the efficiencies Clearwater would be able to deliver, and that users across the spectrum, leading to complete functional alignment and trust. Finally, they talked to a number of our clients, and then even though they had several years remaining on their contract with the previous vendor, they signed with us this past quarter. Another client is a North American full-service life insurance company. They recently went through an acquisition, essentially doubling their AUM.
At a recent meeting with the chief investment officer, we learned of their plan to diversify into adjacent geographies and markets, and the challenges that would pose from an infrastructure point of view. We demonstrated the Clearwater platform and its ability to report comprehensively and seamlessly of assets around the world. Not only that, but we could also generate financial reports in local GAAP and address local regulatory needs. That convinced them to sign a seven-figure deal. Of course, we also signed a number of six-figure deals with medium-sized businesses. Let me start with an asset management firm with a variety of institutional customers. Before signing with Clearwater, this business had grown tired of continuous band-aid solutions.
They turned to Clearwater for a comprehensive portfolio of front, middle, and back-office reporting, relying on the depth and breadth of Clearwater, Clearwater JUMP, LPx, and Prism.
Using Clearwater JUMP, this client is implementing a new OMS and PMS, while Clearwater LPx Clarity provides the front office with the transparency needed to understand risk and exposure in limited partnership investments when making portfolio decisions. Finally, they use Clearwater Prism, which allows users to build and edit reports and client statements and define custom approval workflows to meet their clients' audit, attribution, and ESG reporting needs. The next client is a prominent insurance company in Asia. Their aggressive growth rate put significant strain on their operational teams, systems, and processes, particularly their investment operations team. They were introduced to Clearwater by one of our existing clients in the region. Once again, demonstrating that our happy customers are our best sales channel. This reference led to an accelerated review using a series of workshops.
This hands-on experience with our solutions led to mutual success and reinforces the belief that Clearwater is the disruptive, best-in-class solution. You have heard us talk about how we support REITs, and during the third quarter, we added a significant REIT to our client base. This client chose Clearwater to replace their previous solution. We also signed a publicly held wellness brand to resolve the inconsistencies with investment data and more. And finally, we signed several new clients leveraging our partnership with Morgan Money, a strategic partnership we announced with JPMorgan in May of this year. The joint solution makes it easier for financial professionals to have a global, connected view of their investment portfolios and empowers them to make real-time investment decisions by working on the Clearwater and Morgan Money platform in Canada.
While all of these client wins are very exciting, we are equally excited about the recent progress we have made on two fronts. Number one, GenAI. The response to the demonstrations and vision we provided our clients and prospects at Clearwater Connect was very encouraging. The pilots we have done with our internal operations team continues to build confidence about the impact of this technology on the efficiency of operations team, and therefore, to gross margin, and to the productivity of our engineering team, and therefore, to the cost of innovation. Second, building products that leverage the power of a single security master to single-instance multi-tenant platform.
Again, the visionary demo that we showed a small group of clients under NDA was very encouraging and has led us to doubling down on that area of investment. As a summary, we continue to delight our customers.
We have an exciting roadmap with client design partners guiding our approach... and we are capitalizing on the latest technologies to improve our internal operations and deliver unparalleled scale and growth opportunities for our clients. All of this is evident in our strong Q3 results. With that, I'd like to turn it back to Jim to cover our guidance.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Thanks, Sandeep. Now, let's turn to guidance. Focusing on guidance for the fourth quarter of 2023, we expect revenue to be $98.5 million, and we expect adjusted EBITDA to be $28 million or approximately 28% EBITDA margin. For the full year 2023, we have increased our revenue guidance to $367.6 million, which is an increase of $2.6 million from the midpoint of our prior guidance range and represents approximately 21% year-over-year growth. We've also increased our full year EBITDA guidance by $4 million from the prior quarter to $104 million for the full year 2023. That guidance represents EBITDA margins of 28% for the full year, an expansion of over 150 basis points over the full year 2022.
With that, I'll turn it over to Sandeep to provide some closing thoughts.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thanks, Jim. We have long said that we want to build a truly exceptional company. I'm so happy to report that we are executing ahead of the plan we laid out at our investor day. We united in purpose with our clients to become better together, and I'm incredibly excited about what lies ahead. With that, I will turn it over to the operator for a live question and answer session.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press Star, then one on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind at any time, please press Star, then two. We will pause for a moment while we look at today's Q&A roster. The first question we have comes from Rishi Jaluria of RBC. You may proceed, Rishi.
Rishi Jaluria (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Oh, wonderful. Thanks, guys, so much for taking my question. I wanted to start by asking a little bit about GenAI. Sandeep, when I was at Clearwater Connect, I definitely got a chance to see Clearwater GPT demoed. Seems really impressive. Maybe can you talk about early feedback coming out of the conference and how we should be thinking about the roadmap of future use cases over, let's call it the next year, based on that customer feedback and maybe monetization alongside that? Then I've got a quick follow-up for Jim.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Hey, Rishi, thank you for the question here. Look, also thank you for coming over to Clearwater Connect. So, it's really good that you can talk to clients directly instead of always just listening to us. So, look, here, about ChatGPT and, GenAI in general here. So firstly, we believe it is transformative and disruptive. I do think it can have significant and mostly positive impact on our business. As you know, we launched Clearwater GPT, and then at Connect, we showed a number of demos. And if you get to the next level, what we have done is we have launched and funded five programs. Two of these programs are revenue-generated. They are more about how do we increase revenue.
One of them is insights, which you demonstrated, and the other one was, how can customers talk to the data and really interact with the data themselves without sort of coming to us to understand what's going on? We think both of these are potentially revenue-generating. Two of those programs are efficiency-related. The first one is about improving reconciliation and data, and the second one is how do you improve onboarding and client servicing. Frankly, the fifth one is one, you know, we talk about an NDA because it's something we aren't ready to discuss quite yet. The point, Rishi, is that this is nothing which is going to take us six months and a year. You're gonna- you have already started to see some impact of that, frankly, on our financials and on our operating capability.
So, I would say that do we expect it to continue to improve meaningfully in 2024? Yes, we do. We think it'll have an impact. How much impact? I think that's something we will have a better position to tell you, when we provide guidance for next year. Jim, would you add anything to that or-
Rishi Jaluria (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
All right, thanks. Go ahead.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Go ahead, Rishi, please.
Rishi Jaluria (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Okay, no, thanks. Thanks. And maybe the quick follow-up for that, on that for Jim related, and you know, you're giving this preliminary outlook on EBITDA margins for next year. Really happy to see that, and nice to see you continuing to expand margins as you're investing. Alongside that, though, I'd have to imagine there is some impact on your PNL from the investments you're making in generative AI, the cost, as well as I'm sure there's going to be more focus on driving adoption in the near term, you know, before really focusing on monetization in a big way. Maybe can you walk us through what are you thinking about the impact of generative AI on margins for next year?
You know, how much, I guess, room are you leaving yourself to invest in what is really a big market opportunity and not wanting to over-deliver on margins? Thanks.
Jim Cox (CFO)
... Rishi, that's a great question, and the way you articulated it is exactly how Sandeep and all of us are thinking about it. So, we have already started to see the benefits to a small degree of the GenAI tools that our teams are using internally. And I think you can just see the expression of it partially in the gross margin expansion that you saw in Q3. That is not the entire reason for the gross margin expansion in Q3. It is only a very small subset of the client servicing team that is using those tools, but the results we're seeing from those are meaningful. And so, I think that just gives us more confidence that that 80% gross margin target that we think about in the longer term is extremely attainable.
However, we wanna balance that gross margin, kind of targeting with kind of that incredible client service and focus on clients that we have. And so, we don't wanna lean too quickly into that. We wanna make sure that we're delivering for them. And so, what I would say is, as we think about the 200 basis point expansion next year, which we talked about at Investor Day, and we're reiterating here, even at our higher EBITDA numbers for 2023, there is very limited impact of GenAI within those margin numbers. And I think that what we want to do is exactly what you said. We want to maintain the optionality. We see a very clear path to delivering 200 basis points of margin expansion next year, while allowing us flexibility to attack the opportunities that we see ahead of us.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah, if I can just add to that, Rishi-
Rishi Jaluria (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Wonderful.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Just to be very, very clear. Yeah, just to be very, very clear, we are not optimizing for profitability. I think when we presented at Investor Day, the gross margin should grow simply because of Europe and Asia normalizing. And also, if you remember, R&D should come down, not because we want it to come down, but because that one-time conversion up to the cloud and the investment for Europe have been completed. So really, we don't think that we're optimizing for profitability, it's just a consequence of the business we have. And if I can just, you know, since you asked a straight question, I thought I'd... You know, just to be a little bit more declarative, I do think we are investing in GenAI.
We have a significant dedicated team which does just that, but we're already getting returns on it.Are we gonna invest more? Yes. Are we gonna be able to get results quicker? Yes. That is the power of GenAI. It can deliver results in months and not in two years and three years. So yes, we will invest more in GenAI, and we are investing more in GenAI, but the efficiency we are getting is, frankly, there to see. So yeah, that's how we think about it.
Rishi Jaluria (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
All right. Wonderful. Thank you so much, guys. I appreciate it.
Operator (participant)
We now have Ella Smith from JPMorgan. Your line is open.
Ella Smith (Equity Research Analyst)
Hi, this is Ella Smith on for Alexei Gogolev from JPMorgan. Thank you for taking my question. So, for my first question, I noticed that NRR dipped ever so slightly sequentially from 109 to 108. I was hoping you could speak to what happened there.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Sure, Ella, this is Jim. Happy to take that. If you all recall, back in Q1, when we were at 106, I kind of said: Hey, this is about where we're gonna live, in the high kind of single digits. I think that if you heard me say in-- when we got to Q2 and we were at 109, I said, maybe I only said this to, you know, boy, it just rounded up to 109, all things being equal. I think we're just in the margin there. We're living in that space, kind of where we thought we would live, while we work to continue to build out the GTM function and the additional products and solutions and executing that to drive us towards that 115.
So, we are continuing to work really hard to drive towards that aspirational 115 level. But this is not an easy task. It is a Herculean effort, and I don't think that... You know, I think we will work through all of 2024 to continue to push on that, but I don't think we will get there in 2024. But if I'm still talking about moving to NRR 115 in 2026, I think I will consider that, you know, a failure, frankly, on my part. So, we're gonna push hard. It's a multi-year effort. We're very committed to it, and we wanna drive to it. These kind of quarter-to-quarter changes in the margin, I'm very comfortable with. All the initiatives are still pointing in that direction.
Ella Smith (Equity Research Analyst)
That's very helpful. Thank you so much, Jim. And for a follow-up, so listening to the Investor Day, which happened not too long ago in this call, a huge emphasis obviously is on your product developments and new product launches. It makes me think that you would expect a strong majority of your future growth to come from ARR expansion per client, as opposed to the number of clients expanding. Would you agree with that or not necessarily?
Jim Cox (CFO)
... So, I think what's great. Oh, sorry, go ahead, Sandeep.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
No, I'm sure.
Jim Cox (CFO)
I'll start and then you go. Sorry. I would say that we have-- That is one path, right? What is so great about adding NRR 115 to this level and all of the product development, is that that is yet another path of going back to the base to get that. The truth is, we have many, many different paths to drive 20%+ growth. We have geographic expansion, right? We have these new products, but they are also opening up adjacencies and additional market opportunities for new clients, as well as our existing clients. Yes, we talk a lot about going back to base because it's a relatively new muscle for us, but it's just yet another one of those options.
So, if we have five or six different options to drive that growth, it just makes it a more durable, resilient, and, strong business. Sandeep, what would you add?
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
I think that's exactly right, Ella. That I don't think you can sort of take these pieces and say, "Ah, so if this is gonna get to 14 or 15, then new logos are gonna go down." That's not the way we think about it. What we do think about is, how do we put many irons in the fire? And some will work, and some won't work. And some will be good in one quarter, and another will be good in another quarter. But we want to provide resiliency in our growth. And so, like Jim laid out, there are five things. There's geography, the second one is markets and market adjacencies. The third one is these products and new products we're developing. Fourth one is the commercial model we have made changes to, and that will help.
Finally, at some point, there's gonna be an AUM tailwind. You know, we've not had an AUM tailwind this year. Last year obviously hurt us, but at some point, the value of assets will start to grow. Is it gonna be 2%-3%? Yes, and that's what we would expect, but we obviously can't forecast that, and we don't expect that. We don't build it into our business model, except to note that, yes, that would be another level of growth we might expect in the outer years. So yeah, it's not about one versus the other. We want to work on all of these sort of simultaneously.
Ella Smith (Equity Research Analyst)
Great. Thank you so much, Jim and Sandeep.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from the line of James Faucette of Morgan Stanley. You may proceed with your question.
Michael Infante (Equity Research Analyst)
Hi, it's Michael Infante for James. Nice results here. I just wanted to ask on ARR growth versus revenue growth. It looks like ARR is growing 19.4% in the quarter, probably a touch lower on an organic basis, but you're seeing revenue growth that's close to 24%. I know you've spoken about the delta between ARR growth and revenue growth ultimately compressing in 2024, but can you sort of unpack what's driving that delta right now?
Jim Cox (CFO)
Sure. Sure, I think that that's... So, I think that as you're onboarding clients, you, you can get some catch up in, in, in revenue there that then plays through. So maybe just let me back up for a second and say we are very rigorous and conservative in our approach for the revenue that we describe as recurring revenue. And so, we have lots of new products, and we have lots of, lots of things within our clients, which we are, which we believe will be recurring in nature, but we do not put them into ARR at that bucket, Michael. And so that's a little bit of the, the delta there. ARR continues to... I agree with you, that in the long term, those two will trend together.
But let's say that we choose to commercialize something in a non-recurring way. We would have, at some point in the future, we would have a delta in that going forward. So, I think they're, they're very close to each other, and so I think that that's, you know, when you start looking at last twelve months and those sorts of information, they're trending pretty consistently.
Michael Infante (Equity Research Analyst)
Makes sense. I wanted to follow up just on some of the strategic commentary you made. Obviously, record cash balance and pretty impressive free cash flow generation in the quarter. Seems like M&A is very much on the table. I guess, how are you thinking about the types of assets or geographies you would be targeting? I guess the reason I ask is, it seems like driving towards that 115% NRR is sort of the guidepost, and M&A may not necessarily sort of aid in that goal, but I'm curious how you're thinking about both of those vectors.
Jim Cox (CFO)
I think the best way to think about-
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Jim, go for it. Sorry, sorry. Let's go with it, then we should go for it. Okay, it looks like both of us are gonna jump. So, look, I think that there are two things here. One is we obviously have $302 million of cash, and that's significant because we never had that much cash on our balance sheet. But what's also useful is that we continued to generate cash on a quarterly basis. Now, the first step we took at it was buying JUMP last year. And frankly, we wanted it to play out a little bit. When you acquire something, as you know, it takes a little while for the company, the first acquisition in its history, to sort of play out.
And I think we are very happy with the result, and therefore, we will be aggressive on M&A, but it's not being done for a purpose. There's no real purpose. It's not like we have to hit a certain gross margin target or a certain EBITDA target or a certain revenue target. What we do care about, as you said before, is can it help us expand functionality? Can it help us bring in products we can take to our current clients and go sell to them? Or can we expand geographically? So, I think it has got to be in service of one of those three things. And obviously, Michael, we want our bar to be high.
I mean, these are really nice financials. The balance sheet is quite pristine, and so therefore, we want to be cautious, but we don't want to be defensive. And so, if you haven't seen anything till now, it was because we did JUMP last year. We wanted to make sure we had the right muscle and the right systems to, you know, have them integrated in the right way, and then we will continue to act on this. So we are, you know, we are excited about it. We are excited about what that potential opportunity that opens for us.
Michael Infante (Equity Research Analyst)
That's great. Thank you both.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
We now have Michael Turrin from Wells Fargo.
David Unger (VP in Equity Research)
Great. Thanks very much. Hey, it's David Unger for Michael Turrin tonight. Just one from me. So, this is a refreshing call in software land today for sure. I know we've kind of touched upon this, but can you guys talk more broadly on the demand environment for the industry? Just talking about the, you know, proving out the ROI in a more constrained budget environment. And, guys, maybe going back to that, that beautiful slide you had in the Investor Day, the four bits of tech investment management spend TAM referenced, versus just planning the one bit today. Thanks.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
So yes, I could just talk about that, you know, that specifically. If we think about how we go from the one bit to the three bits, or to the four bits, pardon me, and you think about what is incorporated in that. And so, we think of that as risk, as performance, and middle office, and really components that complete the investment life cycle instead of just investment accounting. And so, when Jim was talking about investing in new products and ideas, it is about that. It's in service of expanding that 1 bit into the four bit. Now, I just want to be...
I just want to make sure you understand that we already do risk, we already do performance, we already do these things, but what we are building is displacement quality software, where a standalone client may be able to buy risk from us directly just for that capability. So that's the difference. We are focused always on what's needed for investment accounting, and our aspiration, as we said at Investor Day, is to move towards the investment management process like the whole life cycle. So that, that's how we think about it. I don't know, Jim, would you add anything to that or not?
We obviously have the whole section around Back to Base, which is about products you can take to a current client base, and that is obviously more important, if you will, because that helps us grow faster and finally, disruptor. So, nothing has changed in the last seven weeks. We still believe that, hey, it's Back to Base, it's adjacent fees, which is the one to four bit, and finally, it is the disruptive products we can come up with.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Yeah, and, Sandeep, that's right on that. The only thing I'd add, I think you were also asking, "Hey, what's the overall demand environment like?" Vis-à-vis what you're hearing from perhaps other software companies. And I would say we are, we are in a replacement market. And what you heard from Sandeep in his prepared remarks was example after example after example of where we are meaningfully better and different. And there is pain out there, and it is a known market. And so, I think that's why we see such resiliency in the demand, that we see, is that pain is not getting any less. And the more examples we have of solving that pain, the more likely it is that more clients will recommend us to their friends, who will become our prospects, and we move forward from that.
David Unger (VP in Equity Research)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
We now have Peter Heckmann of D.A. Davidson. Your line is now open, Peter.
Peter Heckmann (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for taking the question. Wanted to see if you could talk about some of the competitive response you might be seeing in the marketplace. I really appreciated some of the examples you gave of long implementation cycles, you know, some failed in-to-out migrations. But in terms of, you know, do you see some of those legacy competitors mounting a competitive response? If so, what is it? And do you think that can be successful at all in helping them retain some of that business?
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Peter, thank you. Thank you for the question. This is. I wish I had, you know, prompted you with this question. But look, Q3 was very exciting. I, I think when we spoke about a year back or a year and a half back, there was a lot of conversation about competitors launching cloud versions of their product. And I think if you go back and think, listen to what we said, we said, yes, but that doesn't change the underlying technology or the inability of the various pieces and components of working together, like our software does, right? And in Q3, we really got many several million-dollar deals to actually prove that point. And so, the first one that we talked about was, you know, cloud version of a product, spent two years been implementing it.
Haven't had success, and you talk to the client, and they are saying, "Hey, we have to talk to five different groups." Yeah, because there are five different products behind it. And Clearwater is one integrated product. So, we want that, and we want another one where there was, there was a promise of a product two years back. So look, we feel really good about it. We feel a little bit validated in what we have been saying. And obviously, all of you understand technology well. It's not quite that easy. You can't just take pieces of a technology and re-architect all of them and make them all work with each other. Clearwater, on the other hand, our platform was built ground up to work end-to-end seamlessly. So look, we feel like our competitive position, if anything, is a little bit stronger.
I do think as we get more proof points, it becomes easier for us to go to our prospects and say, "Don't talk to us. Why don't you go talk to these five clients and see what they have to say?" So look, we feel really good about, about where we are right now. But, but as I'm sure you heard from us right now, we are not resting. It's not like we are saying we're gonna stop innovating, we're gonna stop investing in R&D. None of that. We expect to continue to innovate and continue to deepen our, our competitive moat. Jim, would you add anything to that?
Peter Heckmann (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
That's great to hear. That's very helpful. And just in terms of JUMP, just following up on there, I guess, versus your expectations when you announced the deal, I guess how... And you-- I know you've announced several deals in several different countries, but generally, how would you characterize the response from either current customers or non-JUMP, non-Clearwater customers in other markets in terms of the feature functionality of the software? I guess, today, are you thinking you need a little bit more investment or perhaps there's a little bit more feature functionality than you thought?
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah, sure. So, I can literally give you the report card on the JUMP integration. So look, the first was JUMP's ability to compete in the French market against largest players. So, there were a lot of large players who would not buy from JUMP because they were, you know, much, much smaller company. So that's clear net positive, that there's no confusion there. We are seeing more momentum in the French market. The second one was ability to sell front to back in North America. We've seen several early wins, but I do think we need to invest more in the GTM in the coming year to take those proof points and then take it across the market. So, is that all proven out? Is that all? No. Are the early wins exactly the kind of wins we wanted to get? Yes.
And so, I feel good about it, but I would say we have to invest dollars there on the GTM next year to take it to a much broader market here in North America and take it aggressively. The third thing was ability to sell JUMP front office, along with the Clearwater platform. And so that is very promising. So we, I think we announced a deal in the last quarter, and a number of customers want that optionality from us, is that you do our accounting already. Why don't you do the front office and the middle office? So, we feel good about it. Is there more work there? Yes, there is. As you get to the U.S., and you sort of are trying to integrate them, I think there is some work there.
And then finally, the last one was our ability to sell Unit-Linked products. Really impressive. It's really impressive. Just the technology and the reception in the market in Europe has been really high quality. So, I would say at this point, I'm, I'm happy with the progress we are making. Have we seen the benefits we want from this? Not quite yet. Is there more investment to go in, in the American market? Yes. In North America, that is true. Is there much more in Europe? Not really. So, so that's how I would sum it. I, I think we are happy with the progress, but there is work to do.
Peter Heckmann (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Okay. Okay, that's helpful. I appreciate it. I'll get back in the queue.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thank you so much.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. We now have Gabriella Borges of Goldman Sachs.
Gabriela Borges (Managing Director and Senior Software Equity Research Analyst)
Good afternoon. Thank you. Jim, I wanted to follow up on the earlier question on the demand environment, recognizing that it's too early for 2024 guidance. In the past, you've given some helpful color on how bookings, bookings momentum today can help you predict revenue T + 1, T + 2 quarters out. So, with that context, are you seeing anything interesting in the bookings environment that would lead you to think that you can accelerate revenue organically into 2024? How does the environment compare to, let's say, this time last year, as you think about the puts and takes to budget planning and revenue guidance for 2024? Thank you.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Thanks, Gabriella. So, I think we feel, feel very strong, and if you look at the last couple of quarters and the momentum that we've seen there, I think, I think that would align. And just... You heard the commentary that Sandeep provided. We feel really optimistic about the opportunities in 2024. Now, Q4 is a very big quarter, and we want to deliver on that, and we're really excited about the pipe and the opportunities that are there. But as Sandeep always likes to say, we have a lot of work to do, and I think we feel, feel very confident about, kind of the durability and the reliability, of this growth, across all of these markets and, feel-- see a lot of momentum.
Gabriela Borges (Managing Director and Senior Software Equity Research Analyst)
Good stuff. So, my follow-up-
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
I think if we compare to 2022-
Gabriela Borges (Managing Director and Senior Software Equity Research Analyst)
Yeah, please.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah, if you look at 2022, clearly it's much better than that. The demand environment right now, if we just compare it to 2022, clearly it is much better than that. Does it mean that we're all super satisfied about it? No. Was the booking in quarter three sort of what we expected? Absolutely. Was it a little bit better? A little bit. But was it meaningfully better? No, it is not. So, I think it is what we expected, and, you know, Q4 is another quarter. We continue to monitor it. We obviously listen to other analyst calls, and we also listen to what our competitors are saying. So, we look pretty aggressively at, you know, how people are doing.
But I do think if we just talk about our pipeline, and you look at our pipeline growth, it is at the highest it's ever been. So, I don't feel worried about our pipeline. Obviously, our job is to sort of convert them with the right frequency and urgency.
Gabriela Borges (Managing Director and Senior Software Equity Research Analyst)
Thank you for the call. My follow-up is on the replacement cycle dynamic in your market. As you think about the factors that drive replacement cycles, some of them are within your control and some of them are not. So maybe just remind us, what are the one or two or three biggest factors within your control that allow you to catalyze a replacement when you have a sales executive engaging with the customer? Thank you.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah, I think that if you think about it a little bit narrowly, like replacement of an accounting engine, I think you'll get the wrong answer. So, I think if you think about the asset management industry, for example, if you think about Clearwater as someone who goes in and replaces an accounting engine and therefore the replacement cycle, then I think it's a very different answer. But we don't do that. Most of our win and our growth over the last year and a half has been on helping our asset managers grow faster. So, there's a big difference. Is that in replacement? No, it is not. What we are doing is we are helping clients get better client reporting, get better analytics, and therefore driving more AUM to them.
We're helping them win mandates. That drives more AUM to them. How are we helping them win mandates?
Much better reporting, a comprehensive view versus the old Excel view. So, I feel like replacement cycle, of course, we are. We concern ourselves with replacing when the opportunity arises, but I don't think we wait for that. I do think if we went to the asset management industry and said, "What's your problem?" Two things: I need to find ways to grow my AUM, number one, and number two, I need to manage cost and become more efficient. We solve both of those, not necessarily only by replacing their accounting engine, right? So that's one. I think the same thing on the asset owner side. If you look at the asset owner side, there is a cycle of replacement, which we are. You know, if they get to that stage, we win a very large portion of the time.
We would win 80% of the time we write this proposal here, but we don't wait for it. So, what is their pain point? Well, their pain point is alternative assets, and therefore you've seen us talk nonstop about our investments in LPx, and then we backed it up with the LPx Clarity, then we went into MLx. So, I don't, I don't think we look at the market and say, "Okay, what is the replacement cycle? What's the jump balls, and therefore what can I get?" Because that's something which we can catalyze a little bit, but we can't control. But can we control identifying the right pain points our clients have and going out and addressing that aggressively?
Yes, and that's what leads to growth. It's not like the replacement cycle has become better and therefore we are growing. We just don't think like that.
Gabriela Borges (Managing Director and Senior Software Equity Research Analyst)
That makes sense. Thank you.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
We now have Dylan Becker of William Blair. Your line is open.
Dylan Becker (Equity Research Analyst)
Hey, guys, nice job here. And maybe, Sandeep, kind of just digging into the customer conference here, right? I know we've kind of highlighted the end-to-end integration, now having kind of the front and back-office solutions, but maybe a big takeaway we kind of came away from the conference was around that insights opportunity. And obviously, AI and automation have been at the forefront here, but what are you hearing and seeing from customers? What were your big takeaways around the ability to drive kind of that level of intelligence through that connected platform? Seems like obviously a big driver of kind of what the NRR opportunity ends up looking like, but would love to hear kind of what you heard from the event.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah, absolutely. So first is, it's really exciting, but it doesn't show up in our revenue quite yet. So, so that is something which you'll hear me internally go on about, is saying this is... Every customer we talk to is really interested. It, it feels like they've been waiting for a product like this and haven't had it. And I think this technology allows them to get insights in a competitive peer benchmarking and therefore where they should invest. But so, so what I could say is, we do think it'll start to produce revenue in 2024, and we do think it becomes a real engine of growth after that, but today it doesn't. If you ask me about level of excitement from our client base, it, it is very high.
You know, we were able to demo things to our current clients and prospects, and it was high, but we also demoed some things under NDA to more limited clients, if you will. And you know, it is quite spectacular what feedback we've got. It just needs to convert to revenue, I'm hoping quicker than what everyone tells me.
Dylan Becker (Equity Research Analyst)
No, totally fair. And I know another kind of subsegment too, obviously you guys have had historical strength and is in that insurance, that insurance vertical. I wonder, to what extent, are you guys seeing and hearing from customers too, how that hardening environment, the ability for these guys to, to start taking rates to the levels that we're seeing there, it's unlocking not only capacity but also kind of incremental willingness to spend? I know international is a component of that as well, but, but how that's maybe freed up, some of the budgetary allocation on that side as well. Thanks.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah, I think that-
Jim Cox (CFO)
Yeah, I think like-
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Look from on the asset owners... So go ahead, Jim. Yeah, Jim Cox, go for it.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Oh, sorry, sorry. Sorry, Sandeep. So, I think that I think you're right, that could be another contributor. All we do know is that our pipelines are large and larger, right? And getting larger, and so that I assume that is a contributing factor to it. We don't know the specific details behind that, but obviously, the healthier our client base is, the more interested they are in investing, expanding, growing their business and thinking about that. And so, I think that's a rational point of view. But the truth is, we just see it through pipelines.
Dylan Becker (Equity Research Analyst)
Sure. Okay. Totally fair. Thanks, guys.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
We have our final question on the line from Brian Schwartz of Oppenheimer.
Brian Schwartz (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Hi, thanks for taking my questions today. Sandeep, just wanted to ask if you could shed a little light on the business activity that you're seeing geographically between North America and EMEA. Sounds like you had a really good quarter in the APAC, but just hoping you can shed light as to how those two geographies are doing. Then I have a follow-up for Jim.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
I think what I would say is just on a factual basis, we've been in North America much more predictably, and I would still say that Europe is still a little bit lumpy. Our coverage around Europe is not as good as North America, especially when you think about continental Europe. So are the deals more lumpy? Yes. North America is just much more predictable on what's gonna happen. You can look at the whole TAM, and you can say: Okay, so many will come to market, and this is what we think will win. So I think we are much more predictable here. Asia is the same way, and that's why we announce Asia, because we don't expect it.
And when you got this deal, we're like: Wow, this is, this is really impressive that it got done in such a short time in Asia. So yeah, I would just say much more predictable in North America, somewhat lumpy in Asia, but in Europe and, you know, pretty sporadic in Asia. Now, we are investing in sales teams in each of these locations. As you know, we have stood up sales and pre-sales teams in each of these markets at the beginning of this year, but it takes time, and that's how I think about the booking right now.
Brian Schwartz (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Thank you. And then, Jim, the question I have for you was just on the sales and marketing expense in Q3. It, it went down sequentially, and that's, that's a change from the seasonal trend that we've seen from the business. And, so I was wondering if you could provide some color on that, and, and did you spend all that you wanted to spend on sales and marketing in the quarter? Thanks.
Jim Cox (CFO)
Well, boy, if our Chief Marketing Officer, Susan, heard that, she would say, "Oh, let's double down. Let's double down." We did have. If you recall, in Q2, we had our European client conference, which is smaller than the US client conference, which was in Q3. And I think last year we had more of those European events in Q3 as a marketing, kind of relative marketing spend. But I think it's, you're right that typically we would pick up with the client conference in Q3. I think we'll see that that trend continue. Sorry, the sales and marketing expense, I think you'll see that trend up in Q4 vis-à-vis Q3.
Brian Schwartz (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Thank you for taking my questions.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Thanks so much. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. I'd like to hand it back to our CEO, Sandeep, for any final remarks.
Sandeep Sahai (CEO)
Yeah. I just wanted to thank all of you. I want to thank you for coming out on Investor Day and, listening to us talk about our company. I want to thank you for all of you being on this call here today. Look, we are very committed to trying to build a really special company and earn your trust, so that when we say something, we execute on it and we deliver to what you expect. So thank you, all, and we really appreciate your time.
Operator (participant)
Goodbye. Thank, thank you all for joining today's call. I can confirm it has now concluded. Please have a lovely rest of your day, and you may now disconnect your lines.
