Earnings Call Transcript - EA Q2 2022

Chris Evenden, VP of Investor Relations

Thanks, Ashley. Welcome to EA's second quarter of fiscal 2022 earnings call. With me on the call today are Andrew Wilson, our CEO, and Blake Jorgensen, our CFO. Please note that our SEC filings and our Earnings Release are available at ir.ea.com. In addition, we have posted detailed earnings slides to accompany our prepared remarks. And lastly, after the call, we will post our prepared remarks, an audio replay of this call, our financial model, and a transcript. With regards to our calendar, Fiscal Q3 2022 Earnings Call is scheduled for Tuesday, February the 1st. And as a reminder, a week from that, we'll post the schedule of our entire fiscal year of upcoming earnings calls on our IR website. This presentation and our comments include forward-looking statements regarding future events and the future financial performance of the Company. Actual events and results may differ materially from our expectations. And we refer you to our most recent Form 10-Q for a discussion of risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed today. Electronic Arts makes these statements as of today, November 3, 2021, and disclaims any duty to update them. During this call, the financial metrics, with the exception of free cash flow, will be presented on a GAAP basis. All comparisons made in the course of this call are against the same period in the prior year, unless otherwise stated. And now I will turn the call over to Andrew.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

Thanks, Chris. I hope all of you are well and staying healthy. Let me begin with a big thank you to our teams who continue to work from home and do amazing things for our players. I also want to extend a warm welcome to everyone at Playdemic who are now officially part of the Electronic Arts team. We're thrilled to have them on board, adding to our continued strength in sports and mobile. Q2 FY '22 was the strongest second quarter in the history of Electronic Arts. We're growing with our leading franchises, new launches, and large services, all performing well during the quarter, and our acquisitions are driving additional growth beyond our core business. With more than 500 million unique active accounts, we're connecting players all over the world to each other and to their favorite content. As a result, net revenue, net bookings, and EPS were above our Q2 guidance. And we're now raising our full-year net revenue, net bookings, and EPS guidance for the second time this fiscal year. Our core strategy is built on four key opportunities: the creation of amazing games and content; tools for the community to engage more deeply with our experiences; the aggregation and distribution of content and experiences to an aggregated audience across platforms, business models, and geographies; and harnessing the power of the social ecosystems in and around our games. As part of this, we are executing against three growth drivers in FY '22: expanding our blockbuster franchises, building on our leadership in sports, and growing live services across our portfolio. I'll focus my comments on these today. With our talented creative teams and powerful IP, we continue to grow leading blockbuster franchises. Experiences like EA Sports FIFA, Apex Legends, Madden NFL, Battlefield, and The Sims are some of the most prominent and powerful properties in all of entertainment. Apex Legends continues to grow as one of the top franchises in the industry—a brand-new IP that has scaled to more than 100 million players and is closing in on a billion dollars in net bookings annually. Season 9 and Season 10 respectively set new marks for the highest active players of Season one. And Q2 was the biggest quarter of income spending in Apex that we've had to date. Apex is growing beyond the game as well. It was one of the most watched titles on Twitch during the quarter with more than 130 million hours of Season 10 content watched to-date, up nearly 40% from the previous season. As the success of Apex Legends continues, it demonstrates how we are building long-term ecosystems in and around our biggest franchises. At its core is outstanding gameplay, embedded in an immersive world of lore and characters that continues to expand. Seasons of new content and in-game events, like the recent collection event, keep the experience fresh for new and returning players. We've introduced new experiences like the squad-based arenas and recently added a ranked mode. The Apex Legends esports ecosystem is growing as well, with the second year of Apex Legends Global Series now on the way. Apex is moving from strength to strength, and we will add to that when we bring Apex Legends to mobile platforms later this year. Battlefield, another of our blockbuster properties, is beloved by tens of millions of fans. Ahead of our upcoming Battlefield 2042 launch this month, 7.7 million players participated in the Battlefield 2042 open beta in October, including 3.1 million during the early access period, which is the largest early access event we've ever had. This is an opportunity to take an early version of the game still in development, bringing a large audience into the experience to test and learn ahead of launch. With a small squad for the game in our open beta, we brought players into the full-scale, 128-player combat, and many of the only-in-Battlefield moments that make this franchise so special. The engagement and feedback from players will help our teams refine the gameplay as we move towards launch. We've now revealed all three of the game’s pillars—128-player multiplayer, breakthrough modes, and Battlefield Portal, a new feature that has the community very excited to create their own Battlefield experiences. We're looking forward to players getting to all of these experiences when the full Battlefield 2042 game launches on November 19. Keeping in mind, we're continuing to grow our leadership in sports through new games, acquisitions, and new areas of expansion. Our global football (or soccer, as we say in North America) franchise is one of the leading game properties in the world, with approximately 100 million players across all platforms in the first six months of the fiscal year. EA Sports FIFA 22, which launched at the very end of Q2, is off to the strongest start in franchise history. The innovation in our new Hot promotion technology has revolutionized gameplay and inspired, engaged, and grown the community. Total players were up 16%, and franchise players are up nearly 50% year-over-year from launch. With net bookings also up significantly year-over-year from launch. We're seeing growth across the game, with Ultimate Team engagement up 15% year-over-year, and more players coming into Volta and career modes. There is strength in all areas of our global football franchise, including mobile, where we will later this fiscal year bring new modes, new features, and improved gameplay that create our most rewarding mobile football experience today. For nearly 30 years, EA Sports has been driven to create the best global football franchise in the world. Moving forward, we're in a position to drive greater growth in line with the continued expansion and popularity of the sport. With the talent of our development teams, our robust portfolio of more than 300 licensed partners, including the Premier League, UEFA, CONMEBOL, the Bundesliga, LaLiga, Serie A, the MLS, and many more. And our expertise in growth areas like esports and mobile. EA Sports is ready to activate across the full spectrum of the football world. We have opportunities in new modalities of play and new social experiences that will bring more fans together. As the sport grows, we have the chance to expand cultural and lifestyle experiences through brand partnerships and content that our fans want more of in and around the game. And we will continue to lead with the most innovative games on more platforms, bringing the full breadth of the sport to the forefront from grassroots football to more women’s league teams and clients. We are more confident than ever about our broad future in football, and we will grow our franchise's leadership with our partners around the world. We are continually investing in innovation, creativity, and all fronts to bring EA Sports games closer to the heart of real-world sporting fans. Engagement in Madden NFL '22 has grown each week of this NFL season as players jump into the refreshed Franchise Mode and Madden Ultimate Team to connect and compete with their friends. We've grown the implementation business year-over-year as F1 2021 from Codemasters continues to bring in more players and keep fans engaged in one of the most intense F1 seasons in years. NHL 22 launched in October, just as the NHL season began, with a new next-generation console experience delivering a dramatic visual and gameplay leap for hockey fans. With a portfolio that now spans global football, American football, basketball, hockey, baseball, golf, UFC Fighting, and racing, no other entertainment provider in the world has the reach across top-level leagues, teams, and partners like EA Sports. We have a unique opportunity to bring together these properties and passionate players enabling social connections through more innovative experiences and content. Expanding live services across our portfolio, particularly in mobile, is our third growth driver for FY 2022. In Q2, we closed the acquisition of Playdemic, creators of the massively successful Golf Clash mobile game. We're looking forward to combining our strengths to continue the success of Golf Clash as a live service and bringing the Clash mechanic to more of our sports franchises where our mobile expertise will enable us to create some great new experiences. Our EA Mobile teams continue to derive success in live services, including Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes, which surpassed 100 million players in Q2. Through the collective talent of the Glu Mobile, Playdemic, and EA Mobile teams, we have built a powerful mobile organization within a year. This group is positioned to accelerate growth in our portfolio. More than 15 top mobile live services, as well as introducing new experiences that tap into powerful IP, including Battlefield, for the expanding mobile audience. The opportunities in front of us are exciting. We feel great about the position we are in with strong leaders, including our new Chief Operating Officer managing company-wide operations, creative leaders joining our management team, and our new Chief Executive Officer leading our efforts to grow social ecosystems—all supporting our 19 games as we drive growth in the next year of interactive entertainment. Now, I will turn the call over to Blake.

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

Thanks, Andrew. We had a strong beat this quarter, primarily driven by our live services led by Apex Legends and FIFA Ultimate Team. We closed our acquisition of Playdemic at the end of the quarter, adding both a highly profitable mobile title and a great opportunity for new sports titles in our broad portfolio. We delivered net revenue of $1.83 billion and net bookings of $1.85 billion. Net bookings were $126 million above our guidance, marking it our largest Q2 ever and more than doubling the level of last year’s. We're raising our guidance again for the second time this year based on our confidence in our franchises and live services through the remainder of the year. EA Sports FIFA 21 performed exceptionally well through its product cycle, with engagement in its last couple of months, significantly outpacing FIFA 20. Keeping fans engaged drove strong retention from FIFA 21 into FIFA 22. We're off to the strongest start ever with the new title. Full game sales and FIFA Ultimate Team are both up double-digits year-on-year based on the first three weeks of sales. Apex Legends net bookings were up over 150% year-on-year. There was some benefit from having two collections this quarter, but even so, the underlying growth rate is clearly extremely strong. Apex has delivered over $1.6 billion in net bookings life-to-date, and we're well ahead of our expectations for the year. To launch an original IP and steadily build it into a franchise of this magnitude is exceptional. I would like to recognize the Respawn team for their creativity, deep understanding of the player base, and for their excellent execution, which can be seen again this week with the successful launch of seasonal content. Although we continue to watch closely, we have not seen a slowdown in engagement in our games as countries such as the UK emerge from lockdown. Digital represents 62% of full game units sold through on a trailing 12-month basis, up 6 percentage points from last year. The strong digital mix for full game sales, aided by growth in live services, pushed underlying gross margins significantly above last year’s. Operating expenses, which include recent acquisition costs, came in slightly below our expectations. So now turning to guidance, we now expect fiscal 2022 GAAP revenue to be $6.925 billion, cost of revenue to be $1.848 billion, and earnings per share of $2.03 up from our original expectations of $1.34. Remember that this EPS calculation does not factor in future buybacks under our 2-year $2.6 billion share repurchase program. We are raising our net bookings guidance for the year by $225 million to $7.625 billion. This is driven by outperformance so far this year plus ongoing strength from Apex and FIFA, and just under $100 million from six months of Playdemic. This is partially offset by pressure on some of our mobile titles, including product changes and the IDFA impacts, and some moves elsewhere in our portfolio. Our expectations for Battlefield are roughly unchanged from the time of our last call. We started the year already forecasting strong organic growth, and now we're $325 million ahead of that, having raised guidance twice. More specifics are in the downloadable model we post on our website. We have also raised our guidance for operating cash flow by $100 million to $1.95 billion, with capital expenditures reduced to around $200 million this year, which would deliver free cash flow of about $1.75 billion. See our earnings slides and press release for further cash flow information. As noted last quarter, capital expenditures are at an elevated level for a couple of years as we invest in our employee work environments and new offices around the globe. For the third quarter, we expect GAAP net revenue of $1.75 billion, cost of revenue would be $625 million, and operating expenses of $1.1 billion. This results in an earnings per share of $0.02 for the third quarter. Remember GAAP EPS is driven by GAAP revenue deferrals, which is a very large number in Q3. We expect Q3 fiscal 2022 net bookings to be $2.625 billion, up over 9% on last year’s Q3, which should be noted included last year’s launch of FIFA 21, the largest quarter ever for Q3 in the Company’s history. The games and live service teams are driving continued growth in our franchises, and we have Battlefield launching in just over a week. Our broad portfolio of games and live services positions us well for a strong holiday season, with growth drivers in place for this year, next year, and beyond. Now, I'll hand the call back to Andrew.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

Thanks, Blake. The holiday quarter is always an exciting time. We're looking forward to delivering amazing entertainment and connecting hundreds of millions of players around the world through each other throughout games and live services in the months ahead. I'm going to take the opportunity here to say thank you again to our incredible teams at Electronic Arts. Their commitment to creativity and innovation in serving players is second to none, and every day it is inspiring to work alongside such talented and dedicated people. It's been a strong year to date, and we're confident in our plans to drive continued growth in the years ahead. Now, Blake and I are here for your questions.

Mike Ng, Analyst

Hey, good afternoon. Thank you for the question. I just have two. First, I was just wondering if you could provide us an update on your outlook for some of your new mobile titles like Apex Legends and Battlefield, and then second, I was just wondering if you could offer some thoughts on the FIFA license, how aggressively will you negotiate for that, and what are some of the contingencies that you have planned for that one. Thank you.

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

Let me start with mobile, and then I'll let Andrew answer the FIFA question. We have not put in our guidance virtually any revenue for either Apex Mobile or Battlefield Mobile this year. Apex Mobile is currently in test in multiple countries around the world, and we never quite know exactly what we're going to get out of test markets, but we're very pleased with the progress so far, which means we could bring it out earlier. But I would say that most of it is really focused on next year, which we think is a positive since this year is so strong. I would put Battlefield in that same category.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

Yes. And I would just cover up. The metrics that we're getting out of those games continue to be very strong. And so, we continue to be confident about the opportunity around both of them. With respect to license negotiations, I would start by saying we have great relations with all of our partners, all 300 of them, including FIFA. As we think about the future of football, we think the future is very bright. We are positive and deeply ingrained in the cultural fabric of football globally and an important part of fandom for football, and when we get to interact with hundreds of millions of football fans, they tell us they want more cultural brand involvement from across the globe. They want more modalities of play inside the game, which go beyond just straight 11 on 11 football. They want more digital experiences outside the game, like esports, NFTs, and broader sports consumption. And they want us to move quickly. And so, I would tell you as we think about the future of football, the outlook is very bright, and we're going to work with our global collection of partners that will best enable us to do that. And we'll continue our conversations with each and every one of them to the extent that they are aligned with that objective.

Andrew Uerkwitz, Analyst

Thanks. I just have two questions for you. The first one is, how should we think about Apex Legends, live services, and maybe even a comment or two on Battlefield live services as we head through the holiday and into next year? Or is it just a matter of more content, better efficiency on monetization, or how should we think about live services there?

Andrew Wilson, CEO

What I talked about in the prepared remarks is that the Apex Legends team has really been very thoughtful and deliberate about the development and building of this live service and the community support since the very beginning. And it starts with core gameplay. What we've seen them do with bringing more players each and every season and kind of our weekly active and monthly active players has grown throughout the cycle so far. They add new models of play, such as ranked mode and arenas. They add new events that are important and more deeply engage the community. As we think about live service on a go-forward basis, you should expect that will continue to be thoughtful and deliberate. They'll continue to build out modalities of play, create more content, and really work with the community on community-level events which really drive the most engagement over time. We continue to be very confident this is going to be a strong global franchise for us for at least a decade.

Andrew Uerkwitz, Analyst

Got it. And then just a second question, Andrew, just high level. You're a pretty forward-thinking CEO when it comes to technology. How do you see things like play-to-earn opportunities within the video games space? There seems to be a bit of an argument on whether that's good or bad for gaming.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

Anything that brings more people in and engages those people for more time in a context is a good thing over time. That is the very foundation of our live services. I think the play-to-earn or the NFT conversation is still really, really early. There's a lot of conversation and, at some level, a lot of hype about it. I do think it will be an important part of the future of our industry on a go-forward basis. But it's still early to figure out how that's going to work. I feel good about our position with respect to that. As a company, we have been leaders in the creation of digital content that has real collectible value, embedding that content as part of larger services. What we know about collection over time is that collectability is far more valuable to the collector when the collected item has utility. I think that in the context of the games that we create and the live services that we offer, collectible digital content is going to play a significant part in our future. So still early to tell, but I think we're in a good position, and you should expect us to think more innovatively and creatively about that on a go-forward basis.

Doug Creutz, Analyst

Hey, thanks. In your commentary, you alluded to some softness in the mobile market. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit more about what you've seen. Some of your peers have reported numbers that suggest there has been some sequential softening in the market. Do you think it is due to IDFA? Do you think there are different dynamics at play with pandemic restrictions easing in mobile versus console? Any color you can give would be helpful.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

When we look across our mobile portfolio, we feel like we're in a really good position on a go-forward basis. We've got strong teams, strong IP, a huge network of players, and global reach. We see the value of that when you consider our ability to offer EA IP for Glu Mobile folks or Playdemic folks to start thinking about new and interesting experiences. We've seen some softness in some of our games, particularly those that rely a little more on user acquisition. But we think that will work through that over time. Again, creative talent, great IP, and huge global reach allow us to navigate those challenges. But net-net, there is a little softness, but nothing that raises concern about our ability to continue to grow our mobile business over time.

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

Don't underestimate the impact of the acquisitions we've made in one year. There are always challenges to the integration of acquisitions, and sometimes those challenges are misunderstood or unanticipated. Some of that is driving our current performance. None of it is troublesome, and we're doing a great job with the integration; it happened quickly. We're excited about the Glu team and the Playdemic team as Andrew mentioned in his comments, and I think going forward, we're in a good position. The biggest opportunity for us is how do we take our existing sports licensors and the new talent we have in Glu and Playdemic and drive new sports products through that talent base. It's a huge opportunity for FIFA, Madden, PGA, and other areas.

Mr. David, Analyst

Thank you. This is David on for Alexia. Just with Battlefield. Maybe you could discuss the key learnings from the data. How much should we read into participation for the early access period as an indicator of demand? I wonder if you just comment on the risk of releasing the game a week before Black Friday. I think this was somewhat of a challenge for the game in 2018.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

The feedback from the beta was overwhelmingly positive. We had some conversations around certain elements of the beta, which is not uncommon in any innovation. We will be able to take that constructive feedback and implement it in the game. When you think about the early access participation numbers, you should read that as a sign of tremendous demand. The game is appealing, the setting is appealing, and the new modalities of play and the innovation the team has put into the game are exciting for the community. I wouldn’t read too much into being a week before Black Friday. While it's the same calendar as Battlefield 5, we did not see the demand level for Battlefield 5 that we’re seeing now. We didn’t have the level of innovation or the new platform technology inherent to high-fidelity gaming like we do now. Coming out of the beta, we feel very good about player demand. The team is working hard on tuning and polishing the final build of the game. They also have wonderful plans for the future of live service, providing opportunities for players to create their own Battlefield experiences. So, we feel confident about Battlefield at this stage.

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

The other thing to remember about Black Friday is that, in years past, there may have been five times more games in the marketplace than there will be this year. We already know many games have been postponed, and the calendar is nowhere near as crowded. This means the need for discounting is nowhere near as high. More importantly, digital downloads now comprise over 60% of sales, and games like Battlefield skew more towards PC, meaning download numbers will be even higher. This allows us to make short-term price changes if needed but without the pressure to offer big discounts.

Colin Sebastian, Analyst

Thank you, and good afternoon. A couple from me as well. Apex’s performance looks really strong. The season updates are driving a lot of usage and monetization growth. I'm curious, beyond those updates and the mobile extensions, is it fair to say that you don't really see a need for a bigger refresh or sequel to either Apex Legends or the Legacy franchise? And then, secondly, I might have missed it, but I didn't see any commentary on Fiscal '23 growth in the release, which I think you had included last quarter. Thanks.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

We continue to believe that the Apex Legends team has been very deliberate and thoughtful about developing and building this franchise. I think there's tremendous upside and a lot we’re doing both in the existing experience on existing platforms and as we expand into mobile. I have nothing to announce today, but when you consider the broader ecosystem of experiences we plan to offer, I wouldn’t discount the addition of more modalities of play to the experience over time.

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

Following the number of characters that are now in the game, as opposed to on day one, is dramatically different and demonstrates how that game continues to evolve. Regarding the questions about '23, remember, we typically don't start talking about '23 until our third quarter, and we don't really give guidance until the end of our fourth quarter. However, we are optimistic about '23. We are very optimistic because over 70% of our business comes from live services, including things like Ultimate Team, Apex, Mobile, and The Sims. Bringing people together in a social network and serving them with content is our special sauce. We aim to give you a broader understanding of our franchises, particularly with respect to our sports franchises that release every year. These live services make our business model more secure than having to create something from scratch and hopes to launch it on time. So, we are confident in growth for next year, based on that live service core.

Martin Yan, Analyst

Hi, good afternoon. Thank you for taking my question. I have two. Number one is on FIFA or sports games with collection elements. In general, how do you think about maintaining the value of player investments and making their annual investments into the microtransactions last longer, perhaps through longer timeframes? And I have a second question.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

Both are good questions. As we think about digital collectibles, particularly in our sports games, the collectability value differs across franchises. In games like FIFA, Madden, and NHL, collectability is key to driving value through the sports season. The short answer is that we have opportunities to expand that value over time, especially as we consider NFTs and other digital ecosystems. The slightly longer answer is, we need to continue to tune and balance the experience for our players. We look for ways to give players more value from their experiences, which is evident in the growing engagement and spending. To your second question around elevating studio GMs to the executive leadership team, it's a very pragmatic choice for me. When I think about growth vectors for us within the industry, extraordinary games and content exist. Each of those value drivers starts with the games and content we create, and I want to ensure that our creative leaders are involved in strategic conversations to drive growth as a company. This recognition is essential, as our next phase of growth will stem from innovation and creativity across these visions, and it all starts with the content.

Clay Griffin, Analyst

Thanks. Good afternoon. I wanted to return to Battlefield. You've talked about a robust free-to-play component. Can you give us a better sense of what that might look like now or do you need to evaluate the engagement with various game modes post-launch?

Andrew Wilson, CEO

When we think about all of our big blockbuster franchises like Apex, FIFA, Madden, and Battlefield, we constantly explore innovation and creativity, including looking at business models. When we look at Battlefield today, we acknowledge that it might make sense to have a free-to-play component as part of its ecosystem in the future. But right now, our immediate goal is to reinvent the action shooter category, which the team has successfully achieved with 128-player multiplayer, deeper engagement in the portal mode, and innovative new modes around the game. The next step is the launch of the Battlefield Mobile model. As we continue to expand our offerings, free-to-play will ideally fit into a larger strategy down the road, but isn't our immediate focus.

Clay Griffin, Analyst

If you evaluate Battlefield historically, the community doesn't always embrace cosmetic customizations as we've seen in other games. Is that a fair assessment? If so, how do you think about monetization without reverting back to a DLC-type model that might fracture the player base?

Andrew Wilson, CEO

I'm not sure that the notion of not engaging in cosmetic content is a fair assessment. The premium model some years ago extended the game experience for a year or so. We saw deep engagements from the community. Although we didn't get all of the community to engage, we still worked with them on different ways to extend their experience through live service. I feel good about what the team has planned. We will give players ample opportunities to enhance their experience without fracturing the community. This is an incredible community, and we’re excited about what we’re going to launch, as well as the plans the team has to expand that experience for global players.

Mario Lu, Analyst

Great, thanks for taking my question. My question is on player packs. In the Ultimate Team, roughly a third of players are payers. Can you share how payer conversion has improved with this new mechanism? Do you think this monetization method is specific to player packs, or can it be adapted for other titles like Apex packs, for example?

Andrew Wilson, CEO

I don't have specific metrics on payer conversion that I can share today. But what we've seen in the combination of all of the advancements we've made in Ultimate Team, including one element being the preview product, has seen higher engagement and higher monetization overall. As we rolled this out, we've seen a different type of spender on comics through preview packs. This is a fun and innovative way to engage with our growing player base, and we will continue to evolve and introduce new elements. As for whether this can evolve into other franchises, I think that absolutely remains true. The surprise and delight of traditional surprise mechanics remain fun and rewarding. We will take learnings from FIFA and bring that back into our sports franchises. The breadth and depth of our portfolio give us tremendous learning opportunities to enhance our engagement across all franchises.

Eric Handler, Analyst

Thank you very much, good evening. I have two questions for you. First, on Apex Legends, I'm curious, a little over a year ago, you started to talk a bit more about localization for the game. Would you be able to give us an update there and how that's impacted engagements, bookings, or whatever? Secondly, I think it's been a couple of quarters since we've heard much about The Sims franchise. Can you talk a little bit about what's happening there? Is it still on a growth trajectory, and where are you seeing innovation?

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

I’ll start with Apex Legends and then Andrew can address The Sims. We're continuing to analyze how and why Apex works in certain markets. There are certain markets where the franchise is incredibly strong, particularly where we've localized the language. Japan is a great example of that. The team has worked hard, especially on the mobile build of the game, to localize more to how people want to play in those markets. We want to ensure that we don't bifurcate the game, but there may be cosmetic adjustments to enhance that. Expect to see more of this as the mobile build goes broader, entering new markets where people haven’t experienced the game on console or PC because those aren't available. This is an ongoing process, and it's hard to carve out financially, but our growth trajectory is linked to these efforts.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

Regarding The Sims, it remains one of the great franchises in the industry, and the last quarter saw engagement metrics year-over-year. Q2 bookings were up 32%. In July, we released the collies-leading expansion pack, quickly becoming one of our most popular packs ever, performing well above our internal expectations. Overall, this shows a growing player base for The Sims. This franchise continues to grow. We have a lot to discuss about The Sims in the future, but the team is thinking of innovative ways to grow that franchise robustly.

Steven Chu, Analyst

Okay, thank you. So, Andrew and Blake, building on the Apex Mobile commentary, we're eager to see cross-pollination between your newly acquired mobile development studios and EA brands. We're excited to hear about expanding the FIFA audience to two billion plus players, given the reach of football. So, can you update us on what you're doing in terms of integration?

Andrew Wilson, CEO

It's still relatively early for these integrations. Playdemic is quite new to us, but we’re viewing this through three vectors. The first is core teams and how to best extract value. We’ve built a single mobile organization from our EA Mobile teams combined with Playdemic and Glu. Jeff Koppers, an industry veteran with over a decade of mobile leadership, is rethinking our Mobile strategy moving forward. The second element is about IP. With these acquisitions, we're considering what makes sense creatively for each brand. The third is our global player network's value, and we're seeing benefits already. Early wins include launching TAP Sports Baseball in Japan. As integration advances, we are optimistic about the opportunities this brings our portfolio.

Jamie Bass, Analyst

I wanted commentary regarding potential wage inflation among developers overcoming recruitment challenges. Can you give us insight into how you're thinking on the cost side, are you worried about increasing headcount and the potential cost associated with that?

Blake Jorgensen, CFO

We're always conscious of spending time managing costs. There's no doubt that there will be some wage inflation. The bulk of what you see in our P&L reflects increased hiring through acquisitions and new talent. We don't expect significant wage inflation pressure, but we manage it closely.

Andrew Wilson, CEO

That said, we are committed as an organization to be thoughtful in compensating our people correctly, ensuring that we keep pace with the market, and that they are fairly rewarded for their amazing work. We have succeeded in doing that well thus far and expect to continue in the future.

Andrew Marok, Analyst

Thanks for taking my question. Regarding the content cadence for Apex Legends, Respawn has been clear about their intention to limit crunch and has settled into quarterly season releases. Is one season every three months the right timeframe or is there consideration to increase the frequency of these releases?

Andrew Wilson, CEO

The answer is ongoing. There is no fixed timeline. We have many questions that remain open regarding development at Respawn and their approach since the launch of Apex Legends. The team is thoughtful and deliberate, closely working with the community. They’ve significantly increased their team size, including additional talent in Vancouver. So could we deliver more content? Possibly. Does it make sense? Maybe. I trust this team to be very close to the player base and to build and develop content over time. That could mean three months, longer, or shorter, but we have seen them maintain player sentiment consistently, and I have confidence in their growth trajectory for years to come.

Operator, Operator

This concludes this conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.