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Meta shared a positive outlook for the year ahead as it continues its ‘year of efficiency’, though its metaverse division remains a drain on the company.
Meta has seen its shares rise after posting positive quarterly results, with increased revenue and more users on its platforms.
The company’s revenue for its second fiscal quarter of 2023 was just shy of $32bn, an increase of 11pc compared to the same period last year. This is the second quarter in a row that saw a revenue increase for Meta, reversing the downward spiral Meta found itself in last year.
Meta also reported a net profit of $7.78bn, an increase of 16pc. In February, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg hailed 2023 as the “year of efficiency” and said the company would focus on becoming “a stronger and more nimble organisation”.
But while revenue and profits rise, the company’s expenses continue to grow at a similar rate. Meta’s overall costs grew by 10pc for this quarter, reaching $22.6bn. This included legal expenses of $1.87bn and restructuring charges of $780m.
The company received a record GDPR fine of €1.2bn from Ireland’s Data Protection Commission earlier this year. In March, Meta announced plans to cut 10,000 jobs across its organisation, in addition to the job cuts Meta announced in November that affected 11,000 employees.
Facebook hits new milestone
Meanwhile, the company’s family of apps – which includes Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and now Threads – saw an increase in users. The company’s combined apps had 3.88bn monthly active users in the latest quarter, an increase of 6pc.
Facebook managed to hit a new milestone in this quarter, surpassing 3bn monthly active users for the first time.
Speaking about the results, Zuckerberg said Meta has seen strong engagement and has “the most exciting roadmap I’ve seen in a while”. Like many big tech companies, Meta has joined the AI rush of 2023 with its recent release of Llama 2 and MusicGen.
Meanwhile, Meta’s investments into the metaverse continue to be a drain for the company. Losses from the Reality Labs division for the last quarter was more than $3.7bn.
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