Magnite Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
May 6, 2026

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: Magnite beat expectations in Q1 with $164M revenue (+6%), contribution ex‑TAC up 10% to $161M, Adjusted EBITDA of $43M (+16%) and GAAP net income of $4M.
  • Positive Sentiment: CTV accelerated materially — contribution ex‑TAC grew 30% y/y and now represents 51% of the mix, driven by SpringServe integration and wins with major publishers, which management says is sustainable.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Magnite DV+ declined 5% but outperformed expectations and showed signs of stabilization, with pockets of growth in mobile in‑app (+8%), audio and building commerce media partnerships (21 partners, 13 deployed).
  • Positive Sentiment: Margins are improving earlier than expected — Q1 Adj. EBITDA margin rose and management raised full‑year margin guidance to ≥35.5%, citing durable cloud cost savings and early AI productivity gains supporting mid‑30% free cash flow growth.
  • Neutral Sentiment: CFO David Day will retire Sept. 30; the company repaid convertible debt, ended Q1 with $185M cash after $29M of repurchases and plans to return ~50% of free cash flow to shareholders with ~$186M remaining repurchase authorization.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
Magnite Q1 2026
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Day, and welcome to the Magnite First Quarter 2026 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the Star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star, then one on a touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Nick Kormeluk, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Nick Kormeluk
Nick Kormeluk
SVP of Investor Relations at Magnite

Thank you, operator, and good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to Magnite's first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. Joining me on the call today are Michael Barrett, CEO, David Day, our CFO. I would like to point out that we have posted financial highlight slides on our investor relations website to accompany today's presentation. Before we get started, I will remind you that our prepared remarks and answers to questions will include information that might be considered to be forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, statements concerning our anticipated financial performance and strategic objectives, including the potential impacts of macroeconomic factors on our business. These statements are not guarantees of future performance.

Nick Kormeluk
Nick Kormeluk
SVP of Investor Relations at Magnite

They reflect our current views with respect to future events and are based on assumptions and estimates, and subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from expectations or results projected or implied by forward-looking statements. A discussion of these and other risks, uncertainties, and assumptions is set forth in the company's periodic reports filed with the SEC, including our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and our 2025 annual report on Form 10-K. We undertake no obligation to update forward-looking statements or relevant risks. Our commentary today will include non-GAAP financial measures, including contribution ex-TAC or less traffic acquisition costs, Adjusted EBITDA and non-GAAP income per share.

Nick Kormeluk
Nick Kormeluk
SVP of Investor Relations at Magnite

Reconciliations between GAAP and non-GAAP metrics for our reported results can be found on our earnings press release and in the financial highlights deck that is posted on our investor relations website. At times, in response to your questions, we may offer additional metrics to provide greater insight into the dynamics of the business. Please be advised that this additional detail may be one-time in nature, and we may or may not provide an update on the future of these metrics. I encourage you to visit our investor relations website to access our press release, financial highlights deck, periodic SEC reports, and the webcast replay of today's call to learn more about Magnite. I will now turn the call over to Michael. Please go ahead, Michael.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Thank you, Nick, and thanks everyone for joining us today. We delivered a strong first quarter, exceeding expectations across both revenue and profitability. Top line came in ahead of consensus, with Magnite DV+ outperforming our guide and CTV in line. Adjusted EBITDA exceeded consensus by $5 million, driven by earlier than expected cost efficiencies, and we are encouraged by the margin expansion we are seeing. Importantly, the broader market trend remains unchanged. Ad dollars continue to shift towards streaming. In Q1, CTV contribution ex-TAC grew 30% and represented 51% of total, maintaining the momentum we saw in the back half of 2025. That strength was broad-based. We saw continued growth across leading publishers, including LG Ads, Netflix, Paramount, Roku, Vizio, Walmart, and Warner Bros. Discovery.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Our top 10 accounts grew in the mid-30% range year-over-year, with the rest of the base growing in the mid-20s. This is not isolated performance. It reflects a platform that is gaining share as the market scales. The acceleration we're seeing in CTV is not surprising. We are materially outpacing the market, and we believe that is sustainable. This is driven by both new wins and expanding partnerships, more fundamentally by SpringServe. SpringServe has evolved from a best-in-class ad server into the operating system for CTV monetization. We sit at the center of the transaction, unifying demand, optimizing yield, managing ad experience, and orchestrating data across the workflow. There are point solutions in the market, but no other scaled platform in CTV combines ad serving, mediation, and monetization infrastructure in a single unified layer. For publishers, this drives higher yield and better control.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

For buyers, it provides a direct path to the broadest set of premium inventory. This capability scales across every cohort we serve. We support OEM monetization across home screens and emerging formats, partner with streamers to build and support their offering, and help broadcasters optimize their sales efforts, particularly as live and SMB demand grows. In live TV, where performance requirements are highest, our differentiation is even more pronounced. Live sports remains one of the largest and least penetrated opportunities in programmatic. We are seeing strong traction here, including more than 80% growth year-over-year in revenue from March Madness. On the demand side, buyer marketplaces are scaling, ClearLine adoption is increasing, and buyers are prioritizing more direct and efficient access to premium CTV supply. We are also seeing commerce media emerge as an important driver across both Magnite DV+ and CTV.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

These partners are bringing valuable first-party data and incremental demand into the ecosystem, increasingly activating across streaming environments. Our recent announcements with Expedia Group, Walmart Connect, and Roku Curate show further traction on the commerce media front. Across all of these areas, our role is consistent. We are the infrastructure layer that connects the ecosystem. As our capabilities expand, so does our position. We are increasingly the single entry point for buyers to access premium CTV inventory at scale, becoming the easy button for CTV. As the market consolidates around scaled platforms, we believe our lead is durable and widening. Turning to DV+. DV+ declined 5% in Q1, which was better than expected. While budget shifts towards CTV continue, we remain confident in the long-term role of DV+.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Trends improved exiting Q1 and into Q2, with signs of stabilization driven by mobile in-app, online video, audio, and commerce media. Mobile in-app grew 8% year-over-year and remains a durable growth segment, supported by deeper integrations and new publisher and DSP onboarding. Commerce media continues to build momentum, with 21 partners and 13 now deployed and ramping, expanding both our demand footprint and data capabilities across DV+ and CTV. On the Google ad tech remedies, our view remains unchanged, and we continue to believe the potential upside is meaningful. Stepping back, what ties this together is how our platform is evolving, particularly with AI. We are embedding AI across the platform to improve how media is bought and sold. At the core, AI enhances how inventory is valued, how campaigns are executed, and how decisions are made in real time.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

For publishers, AI is improving monetization through dynamic pricing and demand optimization. With ClearLine, AI is simplifying activation, curation, and optimization for buyers, reducing friction and enabling faster execution. Across the platform, we are beginning to see the emergence of agentic workflows, enabling greater automation and efficiency for both buyers and sellers. What matters is not a single feature, it's how these capabilities work together across our scaled infrastructure. We are already seeing adoption from the leading players across the ecosystem using our AI to automate workflows, act on real-time signals, and improve performance. This is still early, the direction is clear. AI is increasing efficiency, expanding working media, and driving more volume through platforms like ours. This is a tailwind for Magnite. Before I conclude, I want to address David's retirement. As previously announced, David has decided to retire after more than 13 years of exceptional service.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

He has been an invaluable partner and a steady leader whose financial stewardship helped shape Magnite into the company we are today. We are grateful for his leadership and for his commitment to ensuring a smooth transition as he remains in his role through September 30th while we evaluate internal and external candidates. On behalf of the board and the entire Magnite family, I want to thank David and wish him and his family all the best. With that, I'll turn the call over to David for more details on the financials.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Thanks for those kind words, Michael. I appreciate it. We're off to a good start to 2026. Q1 total contribution ex-TAC grew 10% and came in at the top end of our guidance range. As Michael mentioned, CTV increased an impressive 30% year-over-year, and DV+ declined 5% but exceeded our previous expectations. We're pleased with the results and are encouraged by the many positive catalysts that are driving momentum in our business. Total revenue for Q1 was $164 million, up 6% from Q1 2025. Contribution ex-TAC was $161 million, up 10% at the high end of our guidance range. CTV contribution ex-TAC was $82 million, up 30% year-over-year. DV+ contribution ex-TAC was $79 million, a decrease of 5% from the first quarter last year.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Our contribution ex-TAC mix for Q1 was 51% CTV, 34% mobile, and 15% desktop. From an overall vertical perspective, health and fitness, retail, and food and beverage were the strongest performing categories, while automotive and technology were our weakest performing categories. Total operating expenses, which includes cost of revenue, were $157 million, flat from last year. Adjusted EBITDA operating expense for the first quarter was $118 million, $4 million better than our guide, and an increase from $109 million in the same period last year. Operating expense was better than expected due to significant improvements in cloud spend and some early AI-related productivity gains. Our net income was $4 million for the quarter, compared to net loss of $10 million for the first quarter of 2025.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Adjusted EBITDA grew 16% year-over-year to $43 million, reflecting a margin of 27% as compared to 25% in Q1 last year. As a reminder, the first quarter is always seasonally our lowest margin quarter. We calculate Adjusted EBITDA margin as a percentage of contribution ex-TAC. GAAP earnings per diluted share were $0.03 for the first quarter of 2026, compared to a net loss of $0.07 for the first quarter of 2025. Non-GAAP earnings per share for the first quarter of 2026 were $0.13 compared to $0.12 in Q1 last year. The reconciliations to Non-GAAP income and Non-GAAP earnings per share are included with our Q1 results press release.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Our cash balance at the end of Q1 was $185 million, a decrease from $553 million at the end of the fourth quarter. The drivers of the change were the $205 million payoff of our convertible debt, planned capital expenditures, share repurchases, and normal seasonality in working capital. Operating cash flow, which we define as Adjusted EBITDA less CapEx, was $23 million. Capital expenditures, including both purchases of property and equipment and capitalized internal use software development costs, were $20 million, in line with the expectations we discussed last quarter. Net interest expense for the quarter was $5 million. Net leverage was 0.7x at quarter end, consistent with our target of less than 1x. During the first quarter, we repurchased or withheld over 2.2 million shares for approximately $29 million.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

As of quarter end, $186 million remained available under our current repurchase authorization, which is effective through February of 2028. That we've repaid our convert, we plan to be more aggressive with share repurchases given our expected free cash flow generation. As discussed last quarter, our capital allocation strategy aims to return approximately 50% of free cash flow to shareholders via share repurchases. We believe our shares currently trade at very attractive levels. I will now share our expectations for the second quarter of 2026 and our current thoughts for the full year in a mixed macro environment. For the second quarter, we expect contribution ex-TAC to be in the range of $177 million-$181 million, which represents growth of 9%-12%.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Contribution ex-TAC attributable to CTV to be in a range of $90 million-$92 million, which represents growth of 26%-29%. Magnite DV+ contribution ex-TAC to be in the range of $87 million-$89 million, which represents a decline of 4%-2%. We anticipate Adjusted EBITDA operating expenses to be in the range of $115 million-$117 million, which implies Adjusted EBITDA margin of 34%-36%.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

For the full year 2026, we reaffirm total contribution ex-TAC growth to be at least 11%, reaffirm Adjusted EBITDA percentage growth in the mid-teens, raise Adjusted EBITDA margin to be at least 35.5% from greater than 35%, raise free cash flow growth to be in the mid-30% range from greater than 30%, and reaffirm CapEx of approximately $60 million, a reduction from prior year. I want to point out that our estimates do not include any potential market share gains as a result of remedies from the Google ad tech trial. Lastly, a note regarding our tax position. We would not expect to have any significant increases in cash taxes. Finally, on a personal note, I'm incredibly pleased with our performance and the robust financial position the company maintains today.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

It is from this position of strength that I've decided to retire, marking the end of what has been the most rewarding chapter of my professional life. My journey here from the early days of Rubicon Project through our 2014 IPO, transformative merger with Telaria, and the acquisitions of SpotX and SpringServe has been an exhilarating ride, and I'm immensely proud of the durable company we've built, our winning culture, and our world-class finance team. While I am looking forward to spending more time with my family, I will continue to energetically serve as CFO through September 30th to ensure our momentum continues uninterrupted and to assist Michael and the board in identifying my successor. I leave with full confidence that Magnite is extremely well-positioned to lead the future of digital advertising. Thank you all for an unforgettable decade-plus partnership.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

With that, let's open the line for Q&A.

Operator

We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask the question you may press star, then one on your touch-tone phone, if you are using speaker phone please pick up your handset before pressing the key. If there anytime your question has been address and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star then two, we ask you please to let yourself to one question and one follow up. If you have additional question please rejoin the question queue. At this time we will pause momentarily to assemble our router.

Operator

The first question today comes from Daniel Kurnos with StoneX. Please go ahead.

Daniel Kurnos
Managing Director and Analyst at StoneX

Great. Thanks. Good afternoon, and, let me be the first, David, to wish you the best. It's been a pleasure working with you. Michael, let me jump in and just kinda unpack Magnite DV+ a little bit for a second. You know, your comments suggest that we're still seeing mix shift to CTV, but your guide suggests, I mean, you talked about stabilization. Your guide's almost flat in 2Q. I'm just trying to figure out how much of that is sort of these commerce media wins backing up here and how you think that might trend as we kind of proceed through the year, understanding there's uncertainty in the macro and the pressures that we're still seeing in sort of the traditional desktop business.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah, Dan, notice you didn't say it was a pleasure to work with me, so that's kind of hurting. Yeah, no good observation. You know, we do think we've seen stabilization return to Magnite DV+, you know, driven largely by, you know, it's a, it's a portfolio, right? The Open Web, display certainly under siege, but other pockets, mobile, app, commerce media, as you pointed out, audio are growth areas for us. You know, I do think macro weighs heavy on Magnite DV+ particularly, you know, seeing it return to flattish is something that I think would still outperform market, and that's kind of where I think we should be in either one of our businesses.

Daniel Kurnos
Managing Director and Analyst at StoneX

I promise you, Michael, when you eventually someday down the line retire, I'll say very nice things about you. The other thing that I wanted to ask about, just quickly since you brought up, you know, sports, live sports and some of the drivers there. Obviously, we have a very big event coming up this summer, World Cup. I know you've been asked about it before. We're kind of a month out now. We're starting to get to see a little bit more what Fox's strategy is there, and we're finally gonna get real games on Tubi. They have, you know, DTC out there now. Just curious how we should be thinking about sort of the impact of that event.

Daniel Kurnos
Managing Director and Analyst at StoneX

It seems like every time we get one of these big events, even starting with Olympics this year, and you mentioned March Madness, more and more inventory shifts to programmatic. I don't know if you think that that's also an incremental catalyst for more inventory to keep moving in that direction.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

It'll certainly be a good guy for us. I do think given the volume of games and some of the added ad breaks, for instance, the mandatory water breaks, that's gonna be a big ad load there. I think that, we're expecting good things from it. Not so sure it'll be something that we'll be citing as a comp issue in 2027. It'll certainly be part of the portfolio of the sports that's going to add to the revenue growth.

Operator

The next question comes from Shyam Patil with Susquehanna. Please go ahead.

Shyam Patil
Shyam Patil
Analyst at Susquehanna

Hey, guys. Congrats on the results, and David, on your retirement as well. I had a couple of questions. I guess the first one, David, in your remarks, you talked a little bit about just kind of like a side comment almost about kind of the uncertain macro. I was just curious, did this have any impact on you guys in 1Q or 2Q? Obviously, very strong results, you know, would they have been even better if it weren't for some of the macro events? Second one, Michael, you know, obviously very strong CTV growth, very strong outlook as well for CTV. Is there any reason to think that CTV can't continue to grow at these levels going forward, you know, maybe kind of on a secular level?

Shyam Patil
Shyam Patil
Analyst at Susquehanna

Just related, how are you guys thinking about just the secular profile for desktop and mobile? Thank you, guys.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Great. On the macro front, it certainly wasn't, you know, I'd say an overwhelming, you know, drag on the quarter. You know, you see it in a couple of verticals, in particular, you know, automotive, most importantly, and that was down significantly. Technology also. You know, you see some impacts from there's still some overhang from, you know, some of the tariff challenges, supply chain challenges, and then just the uncertainty with things in the Mid East. Yeah, those are the data points underlying my comment. It's, you know, it's not booming, but it's, you know, we're not prognosticating doom and gloom either.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Shyam Patil. On the CTV front, we're really pleased with the growth rates and feel very strongly that they're sustainable. You know, the market as a whole, you know, looks like from peer reports and analyst expectations, it's growing in the, you know, low 10s. We're significantly outperforming market growth, and that's been a goal, a stated goal of ours, and I think that will continue just given the penetration that we have with all the top streamers, their growth profiles, and increasing wins across the globe. It's pretty much an untold story for us is the success of these streamers that are U.S.-based.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

When they go international, we go with them, and then they have the added benefit of disrupting the local market, and they're forced to adopt programmatic and forced to adopt streaming. It's a real positive story for us internationally. As far as Magnite DV+ is concerned, yeah, you know, it's a difficult one because, again, it's a portfolio. In terms of the high-growth areas, certainly, in-app mobile is a huge growth category. Audio, very promising growth category. Things like even digital out-of-home, you see all the outdoor companies report how fast that's growing. We think that Magnite DV+ as a whole is an important part of the business and will be a positive contributor.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Just kind of hard to swag it in terms of what you should expect going forward on a specific basis.

Shyam Patil
Shyam Patil
Analyst at Susquehanna

Great. Thank you, guys.

Operator

The next question comes from Jason Kreyer with Craig-Hallum. Please go ahead.

Jason Kreyer
Jason Kreyer
Analyst at Craig-Hallum

Great. Thank you. Michael, I wanted to ask on AI. I know you've brought some new solutions to market in the last several weeks. I'm just curious, can you talk about maybe demand and adoption trends of AI-enabled tools? Maybe just give some perspective on what pain points you think exist in the industry that you can leverage AI to help, you know, make those more efficient.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah. Great question, Jason. Wow, no love for David. AI is 2026 will be the story of AI with modest amounts of revenue flowing through. There's several working initiatives, several different standards out there. A lot of it is replacing direct sold, so not even truly the programmatic real time, but bringing more dollars into the programmatic ecosystem because it's so much easier to do it agentically. I think the biggest benefit you're gonna see from it is workflow and productivity because these are easier to use instead of toggling between 13 different dashboards, and you can just natural language ask the agent to perform a task. It really will free up a lot of bandwidth for the traders. It'll be more efficient.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

There'll be more working media going to it. I think we're exceptionally well-positioned from the tools that we built and the tools that we are building to be able to catch it when the dollars start to flow. I would imagine in 2027 won't be the year of the story of AI. It will actually be resulting in real revenue. I think, again, we're really well-positioned to take advantage of that.

Jason Kreyer
Jason Kreyer
Analyst at Craig-Hallum

Thank you. David gets his own question. David, congratulations on your retirement.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Thanks, Jason.

Jason Kreyer
Jason Kreyer
Analyst at Craig-Hallum

My pleasure working for you for most of that 13 years.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Back at ya.

Jason Kreyer
Jason Kreyer
Analyst at Craig-Hallum

Question for you. Thank you. I wanted to touch on the EBITDA OpEx that came in better for Q1. You're guiding for that better for Q2, and I know you called out, like, the cloud and AI benefits. How durable are those savings, and do you think there's more to squeeze out of that as we move forward?

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

I think as a general matter, the savings are very durable. You know, the primary driver of those savings are kind of two fronts. One is, moving some of our activity from the cloud to on-prem, and also our dev team is doing a great job in optimizing, you know, how we run, you know, more efficiently on the cloud. I'm really excited about that. Now that said, we do have some resources into our product development, you know, later in the year.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

We've got, you know, a lot of new business and volume increases. You know, I wouldn't go too crazy with, you know, lowering costs. The trend line is definitely durable, and we have, you know, more to come on that front. We'll have a new data center in Northern California that will come online later in the year and, you know, lots of opportunity, particularly as we spring into 2027 on the margin expansion front.

Operator

The next question comes from Laura Martin with Needham. Please go ahead.

Laura Martin
Laura Martin
Analyst at Needham

I have two. One is, Taboola said on their call this morning that they see programmatic workflows being replaced by agentic. You just mentioned that you thought it might be additive, but why don't we have agentic buy-side agents sort of talking directly to agentic sell-side agents in the ad business and therefore getting rid of most of the 40%-50% take rate that currently sits in the open web programmatic ecosystem? That's my first question. My second question is on pricing power. Maybe David, this is you, and goodbye. It was wonderful working with you. I'm not sure who this is for. On the pricing, one of the things that came out of Possible is everybody's introducing AI products. Nobody is charging for them.

Laura Martin
Laura Martin
Analyst at Needham

They are all just table stakes, and they're sort of making everybody's products more interesting, more automated, higher returns on ad spend. That's my question. Are we actually gonna get price uplift by all these AI innovations, or is it just gonna become table stakes and we spend money in AI, but we don't actually get any revenue upside? Thanks.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Hey, Laura Martin, it's Michael Barrett. I'll grab the first one. Certainly that's been an overhang for a lot of companies, software companies about agentic replacing the need for those companies. I really feel as though, as we said in our previous quarter script and this one, that AI is a real tailwind for us. It makes things easier to work with. It makes our publishers have to go from 12 different dashboards, a SpringServe dashboard, a DV+, to one, and they can execute more seamlessly. The agent-to-buyer connection and the talking of the two makes a ton of sense. Who's to say that that buyer agent isn't ours that they're utilizing just like they utilize ClearLine? I think there's a real upside there.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Also, if you wanna conduct conversations, execute plans, and buy programmatically from 10s of thousands of buyer agents, that's where we really shine, right? We make sure that those are the agents you wanna talk to, that it's legit inventory. We're collecting payment. We're policing fraud. Our plumbing, our bandwidth, our servers are all being utilized to make it happen. We just feel that it's going to be more volume on the platform than we've ever seen. Yes, we will charge for that, and it will improve our margin profiles, not be a pressure on it.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

I think Michael's kind of hit it, you know, just building on that. Particularly as you look at, for example, in CTV where, you know, we do have lower, you know, take rates at the moment, but those are stabilizing and there's so much value add as we provide those additional value-added services. We only see those increasing in the future, I think that, you know, that value add will be accelerated with the AI implementations that we're making.

Laura Martin
Laura Martin
Analyst at Needham

Thank you.

Operator

The next question comes from Naved Khan with B. Riley. Please go ahead.

Naved Khan
Naved Khan
Managing Director of technology Research at B. Riley

Great. Thank you very much. A couple of questions from me and David, all the best.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Thanks.

Naved Khan
Naved Khan
Managing Director of technology Research at B. Riley

One question I had is just around the commerce media, and I guess you guys talked about how you're 20, 21 partners now, you deployed 13. Can you give us a sense of the scale this business is at currently and how fast it might be growing? Then, in terms of the live sports, you guys called it out as a pretty sizable opportunity. Can you just maybe talk about the penetration levels and where we are with respect to penetration of live sports with programmatic and where it could be over time? Thank you.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah, sure, Naved. This Michael. Yeah, commerce media is super exciting for us. Obviously, we mentioned the number of partners in that, total keeps growing. I think the most important thing about commerce media isn't necessarily the number of partners, but it's how quickly the strategy has changed for the commerce media players. You know, chapter one of commerce media was take my valuable retail data, park it in one DSP, and then force all the advertisers that want to utilize that data to go through that DSP. Now you're starting to see that unwind, and the strategy now is keep the data as close to the, retail media partner, working with an SSP like Magnite.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

That way, you can democratize it and allow multiple DSPs to access it in a safe, privacy compliant way. That is the most exciting, I think, change that we're seeing and a huge tailwind for us there. As far as the contribution commerce media is doing, it has been, you know, a significant contributor and will even expand because a lot of these players are now just adding CTV to the inventory mix. Think about it. They start with their owned and operated inventory, then they go off that in typically that's been in the Magnite DV+ world, and now their advertisers are saying to them, "Hey, I do a lot of advertising on TV. I wanna do that with your data." We're the perfect on-ramp for that to occur.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Really excited about the prospect of even further growth given CTV being part of the story, essential part of the story for most of these commerce media partners. Yeah, in live sports, boy, we're just scratching the surface. I mean, live sports, as a consumer, you see live sports everywhere in streaming, but programmatically, very, very little inventory is bought and sold programmatically. When we cite gains like 80%+ for March Madness, it's minuscule compared to the opportunity that's coming. Super excited about World Cup and the fall slate of sports. Little by little, it's getting more and more programmatically driven, it's a big tailwind for us in that respect.

Naved Khan
Naved Khan
Managing Director of technology Research at B. Riley

Great. Thank you.

Operator

The next question comes from Shweta Khajuria with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.

Analyst at Wolfe Research

Hi, this is Ken off of Shweta. Congrats, David, on your retirement. two for me. Michael, can you provide us an update on the impact of OpenPath, particularly with smaller advertisers and agencies? David, can you provide the puts and takes of EBITDA in the second half of 2026? Thank you.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah. you know, OpenPath, I think we've talked about it ad nauseam, you know, came as a shock to the system a couple quarters ago. We pretty much stated that all the big buyers from the agencies that use Magnite as an invaluable partner had flipped it, us back on. I think you can see in our results that it's certainly not deteriorating. I think that, you know, the OpenPath extinction event is come and gone, we're still here doing quite well.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Great. EBITDA in the second half, you know, as we mentioned, we expect, you know, 11% or greater, you know, growth on the top line. We'll have, you know, we're stable, steady. As I mentioned on the cost side, we've got some nice savings

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

On the one hand, with our cloud usage, we've got some kind of volume growth and some resources that, you know, sort of be neutralizing some of that savings at least this year. As I mentioned, the EBITDA margin, you know, is increasing. You know, we'd expected something north of 35% and expect, you know, 35.5% this year. That's increasing. We're in a great spot. You know, what's really great is our margin, EBITDA margin is increasing, and it's cost-driven at this point. To the extent that we do have upside on the revenue line, that upside will flow, you know, almost 100%, you know, to free cash flow in the business.

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

I feel like we're really well-positioned.

Analyst at Wolfe Research

Got it. Thanks, guys.

Operator

The next question comes from Robert Coolbrith with Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.

Robert Coolbrith
Robert Coolbrith
VP of Internet Equity Research at Evercore ISI

Good afternoon. Congratulations on a great run to David, and best wishes on your retirement, Michael. You're great too. Wanted to ask a little bit on AI creative generation. Just wanted to ask for any update on the role you're playing there. You know, we're beginning to see, you know, more tools released sort of to general availability. Just wondering if you're beginning to see more AI-generated creative showing up in the market, and what do you think that sort of, you know, if that catalyzing incremental demand, incremental creative refresh, what, you know, what does that do for CTV? Then maybe another related question on AI.

Robert Coolbrith
Robert Coolbrith
VP of Internet Equity Research at Evercore ISI

Just, you know, we heard, you know, some speculation about different ad tech players that could play in terms of monetizing some of the AI engine inventory itself. Do you think there's an opportunity for Magnite there? Thank you.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah. Hey, Robert. As you know, we purchased a couple quarters ago a company called streamr.ai, which is one of the leading tools out there that allows small to medium-sized businesses to create a TV ad, to track it, to measure it, and to buy it obviously on our platform and our access to all the premium streamers. That product is really taking off. You know, our role with that product isn't to chase down the small to medium-sized business. It's to put those tools in the hands of folks that have those relationships.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

They're either huge aggregators that have the relationships, and now we are bringing that demand onto our platform, or there are publishing partners that kind of hang that as their self-serve, and when they have relationships with smaller advertisers, they go and use the tool. It's really turned out to be a wonderful acquisition, and we're starting to see the benefits of that reflected in the growth rates of CTV. I'm sorry, the second point.

Robert Coolbrith
Robert Coolbrith
VP of Internet Equity Research at Evercore ISI

Just on the AI engines themselves, the OpenAI and so forth, if there's an opportunity.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Oh, yeah.

Robert Coolbrith
Robert Coolbrith
VP of Internet Equity Research at Evercore ISI

potentially for Magnite there.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah, no, I certainly think there is. I think the encouraging thing is it's very early, but you're seeing in these early stages that the ones that are ad-supported are reaching out for third-party demand. That history's pretty clear. Initially, if you're just gonna work with one DSP, maybe there's not a need for someone like a Magnite. You start to work with three, four, five, six, seven, and then you do it globally, and they have specialty DSPs. I think we feel very encouraged with the initial direction about some of the folks leaning into third-party demand. In that case, SSPs become invaluable, and I think we're well-positioned to take advantage of that when the time is right.

Robert Coolbrith
Robert Coolbrith
VP of Internet Equity Research at Evercore ISI

Got it. Thanks so much.

Operator

The next question comes from Barton Crockett with Rosenblatt. Please go ahead.

Barton Crockett
Barton Crockett
Managing Director and Analyst at Rosenblatt

Okay. Thanks for taking the questions. You know, two, if I could. Let me see. First is just to get your perspective on an environment that I think there's kind of a coalition of views that maybe this is where we're moving, which is that we could be moving to a world where agencies would be working with a single integrated interface through Quad or something to place, you know, basically outcome-driven marketing dollars across a range of environments, whether it be the social media walled gardens like Meta or the search environments, AI environments like Google Gemini or open web. In that environment, you know, where it's simplified at the agency and the front end is, you know, not what we see today, but something different built on an LLM.

Barton Crockett
Barton Crockett
Managing Director and Analyst at Rosenblatt

In your view, does that have any impact on take rates, any impact on revenue flows? Do you think that's where it's going?

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

I certainly think that's a worldview that a lot of people share. More simplified buying tools for agencies that actually deliver upon the stated goal for the marketer. I think that our role remains quite valuable and necessary in that world, right? Again, we're the system of record. We're the rails upon which the transactions take place. It's one thing to have an agent talk to another agent, but if they're involved in a complex transaction in real time, doing it trillions of times a day, you really need the infrastructure, and that's where we shine. The impact to our take rate, I don't think there's any change in what we do in that world.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

It's just probably easier for seller and buyer, less interfaces to go through, less knobs and tools, perhaps freeing up more working media there. Our role remains kind of unchanged as that system of record. I feel confident in our durability as it relates to take rates.

Barton Crockett
Barton Crockett
Managing Director and Analyst at Rosenblatt

Okay. Switching gears on Google Ad Tech antitrust. You know, I think we're sitting here in May, and we still don't have a decision on the remedies. You know, if a remedy decision were to come out today, what's your sense of when you could begin to see the impact of that? Is it something that now is pushed into 2027 or any thoughts of, you know, obviously part of that is a view of what the remedies could or should be. You know, your sense of how much time it would take to kind of implement given all the legal waiting periods and technological considerations.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah, a great question. I think you hit the nail on the head. It really does depend upon the remedy. Some are just behavioral in nature. Some would require Google to do technical work to make it happen. I think in even in their case, they cited a six-nine month window for changing two of the things that they were talking about. I definitely think that there'd be some instant gains there. Again, keep in mind, we see all the inventory, we bring it to auction, and our win rate is very low when it comes against when it goes up against a Google. Therefore, if there was a behavior change there, it could be somewhat instantaneous, the impact it would see.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

I certainly don't think any of the benefits from the ruling is pushed out, all of it's pushed out to 2027. Obviously, we're a little disappointed that there hasn't been a ruling, completely anticipate a favorable ruling for us and impact in 2026.

Operator

The next question comes from Matt Swanson with RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Simran Biswal
Simran Biswal
Analyst at RBC Capital Markets

Hey, guys. This is Simran on for Matt Swanson. Congrats on the quarter and congrats, David. Just one from me.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Thanks.

Simran Biswal
Simran Biswal
Analyst at RBC Capital Markets

Going back to CTV and DV+ for a second. We've been seeing how CTV has been hitting an inflection point for the business. Last quarter, we started talking about the accelerated reallocation of budgets from DV+ to CTV. While there's like the areas of growth in mobile and commerce for DV+, to what extent does this reallocation remain a headwind? Has that accelerated this quarter, and do you expect it to continue for the year?

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Yeah, great question. I don't know if we've seen an acceleration. You can see the freshening of DV+'s growth rate exceeding our expectation. I think, you know, there's a stabilization. I do think that, you know, a big slug of that portfolio in DV+, the type of media is open web, is display. I think it's safe to say that's gonna be a negative grower. Could that be outpaced by mobile app? Could that be outpaced by audio, commerce media, digital out-of-home? Certainly. I think our long-term expectation for DV+ is it's a grower, it's certainly not gonna have the profile of a CTV growth rate. Increasingly, our revenue balance will be more CTV than DV+ for the company.

Simran Biswal
Simran Biswal
Analyst at RBC Capital Markets

Thanks, guys.

Operator

The next question comes from [Eli Neighbor] with Lake Street Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Just a quick one from me. Just looking at how CTV is becoming, you know, over 50% of that total contribution ex-TAC number, how should we look at incremental margins on CTV versus DV+? Is there a mix shift that's kind of structurally lifting the margins by itself, or are there some offsetting costs?

David Day
David Day
CFO at Magnite

Yeah, I'll take that. Yeah, it's generally, you know, it's generally equal. We don't see, you know, it doesn't create, you know, headwinds by having a greater proportion of our business be CTV. In fact, as we mentioned earlier, we've got, you know, significant gains in the cost basis on our CTV business with our cloud costs going down. It won't be one of the more significant drivers. It's a good question, but we see it more as kind of neutral.

Analyst at Lake Street Capital Markets

Awesome. Thanks, guys. That's it for me.

Operator

This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Michael Barrett for any closing remarks.

Michael Barrett
Michael Barrett
CEO at Magnite

Thank you, operator. CTV's long-awaited ramp in programmatic has clearly arrived, and the investments we've made over the past several years are now translating into profitable, scalable growth. We believe CTV is in a powerful phase of its evolution. The shift to programmatic is real, as the channel matures, it is increasingly taking share from both linear television and other digital formats. Before we close, I wanna thank our team at Magnite. The progress we've discussed today is a direct result of your hard work, innovation, and commitment to our partners. Your efforts continue to position us at the center of this transformation. We're confident in the momentum of the business and in the long-term opportunity ahead. Thank you for joining us today. We look forward to updating you next quarter. With that, I'll turn it back over to Nick to cover our upcoming marketing events.

Nick Kormeluk
Nick Kormeluk
SVP of Investor Relations at Magnite

Thanks, Michael. We look forward to seeing many of at our upcoming investor events. just to kinda tick through them for your info and participation. We have a post Q1 virtual NDR tomorrow hosted by B. Riley. We have an in-person AI tech demo with SSR in New York City on May 12th. We're at the Needham Conference in New York on May 13th. B. Riley Conference in Marina Del Rey on May 20th and 21st. RBC Bus Tour New York on May 27th. Craig-Hallum Conference in Minneapolis on May 28th. CFA Conference in San Francisco on June second. Rothschild Redburn Investor Meeting in San Francisco on June third. Evercore's conference in San Francisco on June third as well. Buono NDR with RBC on June nineth. Chicago NDR with Benchmark on June 10th. The Roth Virtual Ad Tech Summit on June 15th.

Nick Kormeluk
Nick Kormeluk
SVP of Investor Relations at Magnite

Analyst and investor meetings with a variety of our covering analysts in Cannes on the week of June 22nd. Thank you, and have a great evening. Look forward to seeing many of you at our events.

Operator

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

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