ZDGE Zedge Inc

UNITED STATES
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
Washington, D.C. 20549

FORM 10-K

☒ Annual Report Pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934

for the Fiscal Year Ended July 31, 2023

or

☐ Transition Report Pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934

Commission File Number: 1-37782

Zedge, Inc.

(Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in its Charter)

(330) 577-3424

(Registrant’s Telephone Number, Including Area Code)

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act:

None

Indicate by check mark if the registrant is a well-known seasoned issuer, as defined in Rule 405 of the Securities Act. Yes ☐   No ☒

Indicate by check mark if the registrant is not required to file reports pursuant to Section 13 or Section 15(d) of the Exchange Act. Yes ☐   No ☒

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days. Yes ☒   No ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has submitted electronically every Interactive Data File required to be submitted pursuant to Rule 405 of Regulation S-T (§ 232.405 of this chapter) during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to submit such files). Yes ☒  No ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, a smaller reporting company or an emerging growth company. See the definitions of “large accelerated filer,” “accelerated filer”, “smaller reporting company” and “emerging growth company” in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act.

If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a) of the Exchange Act. ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has filed a report on and attestation to its management’s assessment of the effectiveness of its internal control over financial reporting under Section 404(b) of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (15 U.S.C. 7262(b)) by the registered public accounting firm that prepared or issued its audit report.  ☐

If securities are registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act, indicate by check mark whether the financial statements of the registrant included in the filing reflect the correction of an error to previously issued financial statements. ☐

Indicate by check mark whether any of those error corrections are restatements that required a recovery analysis of incentive-based compensation received by any of the registrant’s executive officers during the relevant recovery period pursuant to §240.10D-1(b). ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a shell company (as defined in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act). Yes ☐  No ☒

The aggregate market value of the voting and non-voting stock held by non-affiliates of the registrant, based on the adjusted closing price on January 31, 2023 (the last business day of the registrant’s most recently completed second fiscal quarter) of the Class B common stock of $2.20 per share, as reported on the New York Stock Exchange, was approximately $27 million.

As of October 27, 2023, the registrant had outstanding 524,775 shares of Class A common stock and 13,829,798 shares of Class B common stock.

DOCUMENTS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE

Index

Zedge, Inc.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I

As used in this Annual Report, unless the context otherwise requires, the terms the “Company,” “Zedge,” “we,” “us,” and “our” refer to Zedge, Inc., a Delaware corporation, and its subsidiaries, collectively. Our fiscal year runs from August 1 through July 31. Each reference to a fiscal year in this Annual Report refers to the fiscal year ending in the calendar year indicated (for example, fiscal 2023 refers to the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023).

Item 1. Business

Company Overview

Zedge builds digital marketplaces and friendly competitive games around content that people use to express themselves. Our leading products include Zedge Ringtones and Wallpapers, a freemium digital content marketplace offering mobile phone wallpapers, video wallpapers, ringtones, and notification sounds as well as pAInt, a generative AI wallpaper maker, GuruShots, a skill-based photo challenge game, and Emojipedia, the #1 trusted source for ‘all things emoji’. Our vision is to enable and connect creators who enjoy friendly competitions with a community of prospective consumers in order to drive commerce.

We are part of the ‘Creator Economy,’ where over 1 billion people create and share their content across social platforms, mobile, and video games, and content marketplaces. According to Linktree, over 200 million identify as creators, people who use their influence, skill, and creativity to amass an audience and monetize it. Furthermore, TechCrunch reports that 12% of full-time creators earn more than $50,000 per year, while Influencer Hub reports 10% of influencers earn more than $100,000 per year. We view the Creator Economy as an opportunity for Zedge to expand its business, especially as we execute by connecting our gamers with our marketplace.

The Zedge Ringtones and Wallpapers app (which is named “Zedge Wallpapers” in the App Store), which we refer to as our “Zedge App,” offers a wide array of mobile personalization content including wallpapers, video wallpapers, ringtones, and notification sounds, and is available both in Google Play and the App Store. As of July 31, 2023, our Zedge App has been installed nearly 621 million times since inception and, over the past two fiscal years, has had between 30.8 and 36.3 million monthly active users (“MAU”). MAU is a key performance indicator (“KPI”) that captures the number of unique users that used our Zedge App during the final 30 days of the relevant period. Our platform allows creators to upload content to our marketplace and avail it to our users either for free or for a price, via ‘Zedge Premium,’ the section of our marketplace where we offer premium content (i.e., for purchase). In turn, our users utilize the content to personalize their phones and express their individuality.

In fiscal 2023, we introduced pAInt, a generative AI wallpaper maker in the Zedge App. A generative AI wallpaper maker is an implementation of artificial intelligence software that can create images from text descriptions. To interface with a generative AI image maker, a user enters a text description of the image they want to create, and the software generates an image based on that description. In addition, we upgraded Zedge+, our paid subscription offering by bundling together an ad-free experience with value adds making the offering more compelling.

In fiscal 2022 we introduced several new customer facing product features and social and community features, all meant to improve customer engagement, MAU, and revenue growth over the long term.

The Zedge Marketplace’s monetization stack consists of advertising revenue generated when users view advertisements when using the Zedge App (and the related functionality under the zedge.net website), the in-app (or web-based) sale of Zedge Credits, our virtual currency, that is used to purchase Zedge Premium content, and a paid-subscription offering that provides an ad-free experience to users that purchase a monthly or annual subscription. In April 2023, we introduced a subscription tier in the iOS version of the app. As of July 31, 2023, we had 638,000 active paying subscribers. 

In late 2021 we introduced NFT functionality to a limited number of Zedge Premium creators via ‘NFTs Made Easy’. All NFT Made Easy transactions are made using Zedge Credits.

We often refer to our freemium ringtones and wallpapers, our subscription offering, the functionality for creators to market their products and ancillary offering and features, both in our Zedge App and website as our Zedge Marketplace.

In April 2022, we acquired GuruShots Ltd (“GuruShots”) a recognized category leader focused on gamifying the photography vertical. GuruShots offers a platform spanning iOS, Android, and the web that provides a fun, educational and structured way for amateur photographers to compete in a wide variety of contests showcasing their photos while gaining recognition with votes, badges, and awards. We estimate that the total addressable market of amateur photographers using their smartphones to take and publicly share artistic photos is 30-40 million people per month and that the market is still in its infancy. Every month, GuruShots stages more than 300 competitions that result in players uploading in excess of 750,000 thousand photographs and casting close to 4 billion “perceived votes,” which are calculated by multiplying the number of votes that each player casts by a weighting factor based on various factors related to that user. To improve engagement, GuruShots has adopted a set of retention dynamics focused on individual, team and community dynamics that create a sense of belonging, inspiration, recognition, improvement, and competition.

Today, GuruShots utilizes a ‘Free-to-Play’ business model that leads to strong monetization with the purchase of resources that are used to give paying players an edge while still maintaining a fair and competitive experience for all participants. Over the past seven years, the monthly average paying player spend has increased in excess of 11.6% annually to more than $51.3 per player.

As we look to the future, we are advancing several initiatives that we expect will drive user growth, increase engagement, drive in-app purchases, and advance our in-game economy. Some of these include:

We market GuruShots to prospective players, primarily via paid user acquisition channels, and utilize a host of creative formats including static and video ads in order to promote the game. Our marketing team invests material resources in analyzing all attributes of a campaign ranging from the creative assets, offer acquisition channel, and platform (i.e., iOS, Android, and web), just to name a few, with the goal of determining whether a specific campaign is likely to yield a profitable customer. When we unearth a successful combination of these variables we scale up until we experience diminishing returns. Ultimately, we believe that the efforts we are making to advance the product coupled with the investment in user acquisition can significantly increase GuruShots’ player base.

Beyond our commitment to growing both the Zedge App and GuruShots on a standalone basis, we believe that there are many potential synergies that we can capitalize on that exist between the two businesses. Specifically, we plan to enable the ability for GuruShots players to become Zedge Premium artists and sell their photos to our audience of 30+ million MAU as standard digital images or NFTs. In addition, we look to benefit from the experience that the GuruShots team possesses and test gamifying the Zedge App. We believe that successful gamification can contribute to increasing engagement, retention, and lifetime value, all critical KPIs for our business. Longer term, we believe that there are complementary content verticals that lend themselves to gamification.

In August 2021, we acquired Emojipedia Pty Ltd (“Emojipedia”), the world’s leading authority dedicated to providing up-to-date and well-researched emoji definitions, information, and news, as well as World Emoji Day and the annual World Emoji Awards. In July 2023, Emojipedia received approximately 45 million monthly page views and has approximately 9.7 million monthly active users as of July 31, 2023 of which approximately 50.3% are located in well-developed markets. It is the top resource for all things emoji, offering insights into data and cultural trends. As a member of the Unicode Consortium, the standards body responsible for approving new emojis, Emojipedia works alongside major emoji creators including Apple, Google, Meta, and X, formerly known as Twitter.

We believe that Emojipedia provides growth potential to the Zedge App, and it was immediately accretive to earnings. In the past year, we have made many changes to Emojipedia including migrating to a new ad mediation platform, redesigning the Emojipedia website, and introducing localized versions of Emojipedia in Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Portuguese. We will continue to enhance this offering and are exploring new features including a native mobile offering as well as additional monetization opportunities.

Our Strategy

Our vision is to provide tools that enable easy and high-quality digital content creation, connect the creators together with friendly competitions and expose the content to communities of prospective consumers in order to drive commerce.

Our Strategic Flywheel

Our long-term strategy calls for creating a flywheel that leverages the synergies of content creation, gaming and marketplaces by empowering consumers with easy-to-use content creation utilities whose output can be used to engage across a multitude of online and mobile platforms including social networks, messaging, and gaming as well as for commerce purposes. This is unlike the existing dynamic that many gaming platforms offer to players, who can create and sell virtual goods that are valuable only within the context of that particular ecosystem. Although the foundation of our strategy is currently centered around the Zedge Marketplace and GuruShots, over time we expect to expand into other content verticals that have relevance beyond gameplay.

Using our current products as an example, GuruShots is a skill-based game that attracts creators (mainly, amateur photographers) with friendly photo competitions in which they compete to gain recognition and pedigree. We believe that adding the ability to sell their content to Zedge Marketplace’s 30+ million MAU is an attractive benefit that enables players not only to have fun, but also to earn money while doing so. This dual purpose will likely improve user growth, engagement, retention, and monetization while simultaneously expanding our relevance to a broader community interested in high-quality photographs. If our strategy is correct, we will have a flywheel that drives the aforementioned KPIs while also enabling us to expand into new verticals (through internal development or acquisition), gamify them, and add new content to our marketplace.

Executing this strategy calls for concentrating our efforts on the following goals:

Our Competitive Advantages

We believe that the following competitive strengths will drive the growth of our business:

Competition

We face competition in all aspects of our business and especially from other digital marketplaces and gaming companies. In running our business, we need to account for:

Our History

In 2003, Tom Arnoy, Kenneth Sundnes, and Paul Shaw launched a consumer website at www.zedge.net that people used to upload and download ringtones.

In December 2006, IDT Corporation acquired 90% of Zedge. Zedge Holdings, Inc. was incorporated in Delaware in 2008, and our name was changed to Zedge, Inc. in 2016.

In 2009, we introduced the Android version of our Zedge App. The Zedge App provided ease of use by negating the need for customers to first download a ringtone or wallpaper to their computer and then upload that content to their mobile phone.

We launched the iOS version of our Zedge App in 2013, followed by the launch of the Windows Mobile Zedge App in 2014.

During 2014 and 2015, our Zedge App introduced app icons, social sharing features, marketing automation capabilities, and expanded the number of languages supported.

In 2016, IDT Corporation spun off our stock to its stockholders, and our Class B Common Stock was listed on the NYSE American with the ticker symbol “ZDGE”.

In March 2018, we completed the launch of Zedge Premium, a section of our marketplace where artists can launch a virtual store and market, distribute, and sell their digital content, including wallpapers, video wallpapers, ringtones, and notification sounds to our users.

In January 2019, we started offering freemium Zedge App Android users the ability to convert into paying subscribers in exchange for removing unsolicited advertisements from our Zedge App. As of July 31, 2023, we had approximately 638,000 active subscribers. In April 2023, we introduced a subscription tier in the iOS version of the app.

In August 2020, Jonathan Reich was promoted to Chief Executive Officer, and Yi Tsai was promoted to Chief Financial Officer.

In August 2021, we acquired Emojipedia, the world’s leading authority dedicated to providing up-to-date and well-researched emoji definitions, information, and news as well as World Emoji Day and the annual World Emoji Awards.

In December 2021, we introduced NFT functionality to a limited number of Zedge Premium creators via ‘NFTs Made Easy’. All NFT Made Easy transactions are made using Zedge Credits.

In April 2022, we acquired GuruShots, a recognized category leader that fuses photography with mobile gaming. GuruShots, headquartered in Israel, offers a platform spanning iOS, Android, and the web that gamifies photography by providing a fun, educational, and structured way for amateur photographers – essentially anyone with a mobile phone – to compete in a wide variety of contests showcasing their photos while gaining recognition with votes, badges, and awards. On a monthly basis, GuruShots users currently cast close to 4 billion “perceived votes” in more than 300 competitions. GuruShots currently generates revenue from selling digital resources that, if used skillfully, can provide additional visibility to competitors’ photographs, a critical factor in securing votes for competitive ranking.

In December 2022, we introduced ‘pAInt’ our generative AI wallpaper maker within the Zedge App. pAInt enables users to create high quality images by typing a brief description of what they are interested in and tuning with different style types. In parallel with the introduction of pAInt we also rolled out another in-app currency used for creating wallpapers.

Our Technology

Our eco-system is powered by a scalable distributed platform that comprises both open source and proprietary technologies centered on content management and discovery, web and app development, data science and analytics, deep learning, mobile content/device compatibility, advertising/marketing tech, and reporting. We have built a robust platform that allows us to ideate, test, analyze, and launch where warranted by the outcome and we have embraced machine learning, including AI, throughout our technology stack in order to improve content creation, recommendations and relevancy. From an end user’s perspective, our platform minimizes response latency while factoring in cost and focuses on key areas including content creation, relevancy and discoverability. We optimize our platform by utilizing systems, algorithms, and heuristics that organize our content based on real user data and that renders the content in a relevant fashion. With GuruShots, we have added open source and proprietary technologies around gamification, including ranking algorithms that ensure fair exposure to all content in a competition, and real-time voting/ranking functionality at scale, and a personal competition recommendations system based on users’ photos and historical activity. Our infrastructure provides a fully redundant production environment in a cloud-hosted, virtual-server environment.

Intellectual Property

Our trademarks, copyrights, domain names, proprietary technology, know-how, and other intellectual property are vital to our success. We seek to protect our intellectual property rights by relying on federal, state, and common law rights in the United States and other countries, as well as contractual restrictions. We enter into confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements with our employees and business partners. The agreements we enter into with our employees also provide that all software, inventions, developments, works of authorship, and trade secrets created by them during the course of their employment are our property.

We have been granted trademark protection for “Zedge” in the United States, European Union, United Kingdom, India, and Canada, “We Make Phones Personal,” and “Zedge, Everything You,” “Tattoo Your Phone,” “Shortz – Chat Stories By Zedge,” and “NFTs Made Easy” in United States and a stylized “D” logo in the European Union, United Kingdom and United States. We also have applied for trademark protection for “AI Art Battles (& Design),” “pAInt,” and “Zedge pAInt” in the United States, a stylized “D” logo in Canada and India, and have obtained a copyright registration for our flagship app, Zedge. In addition, we have registered, amongst others, the following domain names: www.zedge.net and www.zedge.com.

On August 1, 2021, we acquired Emojipedia. As part of this acquisition, we acquired trademark registrations for “Emojipedia” in the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and Australia, and trademark registrations for “World Emoji Day” in the United States and the United Kingdom. We also acquired the following domain name registrations: www.emojipedia.com and www.emojipedia.org.

On April 12, 2022, we acquired GuruShots Ltd. As part of this acquisition, we acquired all intellectual property rights associated with, and encompassed within the GuruShots mobile and web-based applications, including the following domain name: GuruShots.com. In addition, we have obtained trademark registrations for “GuruShots” in the United States, applied for trademark protection for “GuruShots in Canada, India, the European Union and the United Kingdom, and have obtained copyright registrations for the GuruShots mobile and web-based applications.

Human Capital

Our headcount totaled 94 as of July 31, 2023, including 29 added from the GuruShots acquisition.

Facilities

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, we ceased having a physical office in the United States in 2020. Yet, we still address commercial operations including accounting and finance, and business development from the New York area. In 2021, our Norwegian operations moved into a smaller Trondheim, Norway facility, with approximately 4,900 square feet of space, accommodates our product, design, and technology teams, and is under lease through March 2027. In May of 2022, we entered into a one-year sublease agreement for approximately 2,300 square feet of space for our team in Vilnius, Lithuania. We lease 1,600 square feet of space in Tel Aviv, Israel that accommodates the GuruShots team. That lease is due to expire in October 2024. Our servers are hosted in leased data centers in different geographic locations in the United States.

Item 1A. Risk Factors

Our business, operating results or financial condition could be materially adversely affected by any of the following risks associated with any one of our businesses, as well as the other risks highlighted elsewhere in this document, particularly the discussions about competition. The trading price of our Class B common stock could decline due to any of these risks.

Risk Factor Summary

Our business operations are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, including those outside of our control, that could cause our business, financial condition or operating results to be harmed, including, but not limited to, risks regarding the following:

RISKS RELATED TO OUR BUSINESS AND INDUSTRY

Certain of our offerings, including GuruShots’ participation in gallery exhibitions, are sensitive to consumer spending and economic conditions.

Consumer purchases of discretionary retail items and specialty retail products, as well as participation in gallery events, may be adversely affected by national and regional economic, market and other conditions such as employment levels, salary and wage levels, the availability of consumer credit, inflation, high interest rates, high tax rates, high fuel prices, the threat of a pandemic or other health crisis (such as COVID-19) and consumer confidence with respect to current and future economic, market and other conditions. Consumer purchases may decline during recessionary periods or at other times when unemployment is higher or disposable income is lower. Consumer willingness to make discretionary purchases may decline, may stall or may be slow to increase due to national and regional economic conditions. GuruShots derives revenues form arranging for certain of its users to display their photographs in art galleries. There remains considerable uncertainty and volatility in the national and global economy. Further or future slowdowns or disruptions in the economy, market and other conditions could adversely affect us and our business strategy. We may not be able to sustain or increase our current net sales if there is a decline in consumer spending.

We offer a suite of freemium apps and we may not be successful in adding new users or in retaining existing users, or if our users decrease their level of engagement with our products or do not make optional purchases of tokens, resources, or content, or convert into paying subscribers and renew their paid subscriptions our revenue, financial results and business may be significantly harmed.

The size of our user base and our users’ level of engagement and paid conversion are fundamental to our success. Our financial performance has been and will continue to be dependent on our ability to successfully add new users, retain and engage existing users and convert them into paying users and/or subscribers. Over the past several years, we have experienced periods of growth and contraction, as well as a shift of users from well developed markets to emerging markets and we expect that the size of our user base will fluctuate over time. If consumers and/or creators do not perceive our products as useful, effective, entertaining, reliable, and/or trustworthy, we may not be able to attract or keep users or otherwise maintain or increase the frequency and duration of their engagement or the percentage of users that are converted into paying subscribers. There is no guarantee that we will not experience a decline in our user base or engagement levels. User engagement can be difficult to measure, particularly as we introduce new and different products and services and as various privacy regulations evolve. Any number of factors can negatively affect user growth, engagement and conversion, including:

Certain of these factors have, at various times, negatively impacted user and creator growth, MAU and engagement. If we are unable to maintain or increase our user base and user engagement, our revenue and financial results may be materially adversely affected.

We may not experience growth or engagement in certain geographic locations due to local factors.

We may not experience rapid user growth or continued engagement in countries that have unreliable telecommunications infrastructure or in countries where mobile and internet usage are expensive. Any decrease in user growth or engagement may have a material and adverse impact on our popularity, revenue, business, reputation, financial condition, and results of operations.

We may not be successful in acquiring a sufficient number of users that become purchasers or retain existing users who generate profitable revenue for our apps.

Revenues of freemium apps and websites typically rely on a small percentage of users that convert into paying users by making in-app purchases of digital goods and/or paid subscriptions; however, the vast majority of users play for free or only occasionally make purchases or opt-in for paid subscriptions. Accordingly, only a small percentage of our users are paying users. In addition, a small portion of paying users generate a disproportionate percentage of revenue. Because of this, it is imperative for us to both retain these valuable customers and to maintain or increase their spend over time. In fiscal 2023, we experienced an 8% decline in paid subscriptions. Conversely, over the past seven years, GuruShots has successfully increased the compounded annual growth rate of monthly spending per paying player by around 11.6%. There can be no assurance that we will be able to continue to retain paying users, grow or maintain subscription levels or that paying users will maintain or increase their spending. We may experience a net decline in paying players resulting in a decrease in revenue resulting in a materially adverse outcome for our business and financial results.

We may not manage our in-app economy well and as a result, disincentivize users from making in-app purchases. Any failure to do so could adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Our apps are available to players for free and each brand generates a material portion of its revenue by selling digital goods and/or paid subscriptions. The perceived value of these digital goods and/or paid subscriptions can be impacted by various factors including their price, discounting policies, etc. If we fail to manage our economy well, we risk confusing or upsetting users to the point that they reduce their purchases which could negatively hurt the business.

If we fail to attract advertisers or if advertisers reduce their spend with us, our revenues, profitability and prospects may be materially and adversely affected.

In fiscal 2023, approximately 81% of our revenues (excluding GuruShots) were generated from selling advertising inventory. We anticipate that our growth and profitability will continue to depend on our ability to sell our advertising inventory. Companies that advertise with us may choose to utilize other advertising channels or may reduce or eliminate their marketing altogether for a variety of reasons, many of which are out of our control, including, without limitation, if the demand for mobile phone personalization industry declines or otherwise falls out of favor with advertisers or consumers.

If the size of the digital advertising market does not increase from current levels, or if our digital brands are unable to capture and retain a sufficient share of that market, our ability to maintain or increase our current level of advertising revenues and our revenues, profitability and prospects could be materially and adversely affected.

The digital advertising market may deteriorate or develop more slowly than expected, which could materially harm our business and results of operations.

We generate the substantial majority of our revenue from selling advertising inventory. We anticipate that our growth and profitability will continue to depend on our ability to sell advertising inventory across some if not all of our digital brands.

Mobile connected devices, especially smartphones, are a relatively new advertising medium. Advertisers have historically spent a smaller portion of their advertising budgets on mobile media as compared to traditional advertising methods, such as television, newspapers, radio and billboards, or online advertising over the internet, such as placing banner ads on websites.

Future demand and market acceptance for mobile advertising is uncertain. Many advertisers still have limited experience with mobile advertising and may continue to devote larger portions of their advertising budgets to more traditional offline or online personal computer-based advertising, instead of shifting additional advertising resources to mobile advertising.

Further, our advertisers’ ability to effectively target their advertising to our user’s interests may be negatively impacted by the degree to which our privacy control measures that we have implemented or may implement in the future in connection with regulations, regulatory actions, the user experience, or otherwise, and our advertising revenue may decrease or otherwise be curtailed as a result. Changes to operating systems’ practices and policies, such as Apple’s deprecating the Identifier for Advertisers (“IDFA”) and Google’s Privacy Sandbox which is meant to make current tracking mechanisms obsolete, and block covert tracking techniques, like fingerprinting may also reduce the quantity and quality of the data and metrics that can be collected or used by us and our partners. These limitations may adversely affect our advertisers’ ability to effectively target advertisements and measure their performance, which could reduce the demand and pricing for our advertising products and harm our business. As such, our digital property’s current and potential advertiser clients may ultimately find digital advertising to be less effective than traditional advertising media or marketing methods or other technologies for promoting their products and services, and they may even reduce their spending on mobile advertising from current levels as a result or for other reasons.

If the market for mobile advertising deteriorates, or develops more slowly than we expect, we may not be able to increase our revenues or our revenues and profitability could decline materially.

A material amount of our revenue is generated from a limited number of geographies and third-party advertising demand partners. Any change to this mix could result in negatively impacting our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

In fiscal 2023, revenue from well developed economies accounted for approximately 78% of our total revenues and 51% of our total revenues were generated by three advertising demand partners. While our end users are located around the world, the revenue is generated in the United States from our advertising partners. During the past five years, we have experienced a shift in our Zedge App’s regional customer make-up with the percentage of our total MAU from emerging markets increasing, while the portion from well-developed markets is decreasing. In fiscal 2023, 78% of our Zedge App’s users were located in emerging markets with 22% of users in well-developed regions compared to 77% and 23% respectively in fiscal 2022. India comprised 28% of our MAU as of July 31, 2023. This shift has negatively impacted revenues because well-developed markets command materially higher advertising rates when compared to those in emerging markets. Although we are investing in reversing this trend, we may not be successful in this effort which may result in lower revenues and profitability. Although GuruShots’ and Emojipedia’s user bases are more heavily weighted to well-developed economies, we are still exposed to the impact of a shift in our Zedge App’s user base toward emerging markets.

Three advertising demand partners, mainly, Google, Vungle and AppLovin were responsible for 51% of overall revenue in fiscal 2023. If any of these advertising demand partners were to alter their spend on our digital properties the outcome could result in lowering revenues and profitability.

Our apps’ user base is heavily weighted to the Android operating system and our revenues and profitability may suffer if the market demand for Android smartphones decreases.

Our apps’ user base is heavily weighted to smartphones running the Android operating system, which constituted approximately 96% of our MAU (excluding Emojipedia) as of July 31, 2023, and most of our revenues for fiscal 2023. Any significant downturn in the overall demand for Android smartphones or the use of Android smartphones could significantly and adversely affect the demand for our products and services and would materially affect our revenues.

Although the Android smartphone market has grown rapidly in recent years, it is uncertain whether the Android smartphone market will continue growing at a similar rate in the future. In addition, due to the constantly evolving nature of the smartphone industry, another operating system for smartphones may eclipse the Android operating system and result in a decline in its popularity, which would likely adversely affect our apps’ popularity. To the extent that our products and services continue operating on Android smartphones and to the extent that our future revenues substantially depend on the use and sales of Android smartphones, our business and financial results would be vulnerable to any downturns in the Android smartphone market.

We may not be successful in diversifying our revenue mix in order to reduce our significant dependence on third-party advertisers.

In fiscal 2023, approximately 76% of our revenues excluding GuruShots were generated from advertising sales. We cannot assure you that we will be successful in diversifying our revenue mix by identifying new revenue drivers that complement our advertising-heavy business. Although the Zedge App had initial success in converting freemium users into paid subscribers, starting with zero in January 2019 and ending fiscal 2022 with approximately 692,000, we ended fiscal 2023 with 638,000 subscribers, an 8% decline and there is no guarantee that we will be successful in improving subscriber base growth or in maintaining our current subscriber base. To date, Zedge Premium has taken longer to scale than we originally anticipated. Furthermore, we are still integrating GuruShots and have not achieved its expected growth trajectory or realized synergies between GuruShots and our legacy operations. Finally, Android users constitute approximately 96% of our overall MAU and are prone to spend less money in apps than iOS and web users. Even if our new initiatives are successful on one platform we may not be able to replicate that success across other platforms.

Our revenues may fluctuate materially due to increases and decreases of new mobile device sales, or other factors, over which we have no control.

Our revenue may be materially negatively impacted by a decrease or slowdown in new mobile device sales. Demand for mobile devices highly correlates to installs of our apps and associated usage and revenue generation.

Initially the COVID-19 pandemic negatively impacted new user growth. New smartphone sales suffered as a result of retail business closures, negatively impacting new user growth, especially in well-developed markets. Any e-retail business rebound will be subject to many factors including the state of the global and local economies.

If new mobile device sales decrease or slowdown, our products and services will likely experience fewer installations which will negatively impact our revenue and operations.

We rely on third-party platforms, such as the iOS App Store, Meta, and Google Play Store, to distribute our apps and collect revenues generated on these platforms. If these platforms adopt policies including those relating to advertising, privacy, or monetization that are counter to our strategy it could result in materially and adversely affecting our business.

Our products and services depend on mobile app stores and other third parties such as data center service providers, as well as third party payment aggregators, computer systems, internet transit providers and other communications systems and service providers. Our mobile applications are almost exclusively accessed through and depend on the Google Play store and Apple’s App Store. While our mobile applications are generally free to download, we offer our users the opportunity to make in-app purchases and/or purchase paid subscriptions. In certain instances, we determine the prices at which these items and subscriptions are sold. These purchases are processed by Google’s and Apple’s in-app payment and subscription systems. As of July 31, 2023 we paid Google and Apple up to 30% of the revenue we generated across their respective platforms. Our cashflow may be negatively impacted if either platform changes the timing of their payments to us. While we do not anticipate any interruption in their distribution platforms or ability to accept customer payments, any such disruptions, even temporary, may have material impacts on our business and operations.

We are subject to the standard policies and terms of service of third-party platforms, which govern the marketing, promotion, distribution, content and operation of our apps on their platforms. Each platform provider has the discretion to make changes to its operating system, payment services, manner in which their mobile operating system operates as well as change and interpret the terms and conditions of its developer policies. These changes may be harmful to our business and result in a negative outcome. For example, in September 2019, our Zedge App was temporarily removed from Google Play because they asserted that the Zedge App violated their malicious behavior policy. As a result, prospective Android users were prevented from installing our Zedge App, freemium users were unable to convert into paying subscribers and existing users we unable to purchase Zedge Credits. Shortly after the notice was issued, two of our major advertising suppliers ceased serving advertisements to our Zedge App. In addition, Google Play sent a notification to users that had the problematic version of the app on their phone recommending that they uninstall it. We identified the source of the problem as buggy code from a long-term, third-party advertising partner’s standard technology integration in our app. We corrected the problem by removing the offensive code, releasing a new version of our app and our Zedge App was reinstated after approximately 72 hours and concurrently the two major advertising suppliers resumed purchasing our advertising inventory. We estimate the immediate financial impact of the suspension resulted in approximately $100,000 in lost revenue and a material decline in MAU with the majority of uninstalls in emerging markets.

Such changes could:

Google and Apple are able to terminate our distribution agreements with them, without cause, with 30 days prior written notice (to the extent allowed by applicable local law). They also may terminate our agreements with them immediately (unless a longer period is required by applicable law) under certain circumstances, including upon our uncured breach of such agreements. To the extent that they or any other third party platform provider on which we rely make such changes or terminates our agreements with them, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be materially adversely affected.

A platform provider may also change its fee structure to our disadvantage, change how we are able to advertise on the platform, limit how user information is made available to developers, curtail how personal information is used for advertising purposes, or restrict how users can share information with their friends on the platform or across platforms. For example, in April 2021 Apple released iOS 14 which started requiring users to opt in to share their IDFA with app developers, on an app-by-app basis. As a consequence, the ability of advertisers to accurately target and measure their advertising campaigns at the user level becomes significantly more difficult, typically resulting in higher user acquisition costs.

If we violate, or a platform provider believes we have violated, its terms of service, the platform provider reserves the right to limit or cease access to their platform. If we are unable to maintain a productive working relationship with any platform distribution and access to our products and services could also be curtailed or permanently disabled. This is especially true in instances where we are dependent on single source providers for their respective services. Any limitation or discontinuation of access to any platform could significantly reduce our ability to distribute and/or provide access to our products to users and would like result in materially and adversely affecting our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our business depends on the availability of mobile app stores and other third party platforms and any outages that these parties experience will likely have a negative impact on our business, financial condition, results of operations or reputation.

If technologies designed to block the display of advertisements are adopted en masse, or if web browsers limit or block behavioral targeting technologies our revenues may be adversely affected.

Our digital products and services may suffer negative consequences, including a material reduction of revenue, with mass adoption of website ad blocking technologies or other technologies that limit the ability to personalize advertisements, including, without limitation, if the price for this advertising inventory declines.

Activities of our advertiser clients and/or users could damage our reputation or give rise to legal claims against us.

Our advertisers and/or users may not comply with international or domestic laws, including, but not limited to, laws and regulations relating to mobile communications. Failure of our advertisers and/or users to comply with laws or our policies could damage our reputation and expose us to liability under these laws. We may also be liable to third parties for content in the advertisements or content we deliver or distribute if the artwork, text or other content involved violates copyrights, trademarks or other intellectual property rights of third parties or if the content is defamatory, unfair and deceptive, or otherwise in violation of applicable laws. Although we generally receive assurance from our advertising partners and users that their advertisements and content, respectively, are lawful and that they have the right to use any copyrights, trademarks or other intellectual property included in an advertisement or content, and although we are normally indemnified by the advertisers, a third party or regulatory authority may still file a claim against us. Any such claims could be costly and time consuming to defend and could also hurt our reputation within the mobile advertising industry. Further, if we are exposed to legal liability, we could be required to pay substantial fines or penalties, redesign our business methods, discontinue some of our services or otherwise expend significant resources.

We may not be able to continually meet our users’ expectations and retain or expand our user base, and our revenues, profitability and prospects may be materially and adversely affected.

Although we constantly monitor and research our users’ expectations, we may be unable to meet them on an ongoing basis or anticipate future user needs. A decrease in the number of users engaging with our products and services may have a material and adverse effect on our ability to sell advertising, digital goods and resources, and subscriptions and on our business, financial condition and results of operations. In order to attract and retain users and remain competitive, we must continue to innovate our products and services, improve user experience, and implement new technologies and functionalities.

The internet business is characterized by constant changes, including but not limited to rapid technological evolution, continual shifts in user expectations, frequent introductions of new products and services and constant emergence of new industry standards and practices. As a result, our users may leave us for our competitors’ products and services more quickly than in other sectors. Thus, our success will depend, in part, on our ability to respond to these changes in a timely and cost-effective basis, including improving and marketing our existing products and services and developing and pricing new products and services in response to evolving user needs. Our ability to successfully retain or expand our user base will depend on our ability to achieve the following, among others:

We cannot assure you that our existing products and services, will remain sufficiently popular with our users. We may be unsuccessful in adding compelling new features and enhancements; products and services to further diversify these product offerings. Unexpected technical, commercial or operational problems could delay or prevent the introduction of one or more of our new products or services to our users. Moreover, we cannot be sure that any of our new products and services will achieve widespread market acceptance or generate incremental revenue the way our existing products and services have. If we fail in earning user satisfaction through our products or services or if our products and services fail to meet our expectation to maintain and expand our user base, our business, results of operations and financial condition will be materially and adversely affected.

Zedge Premium, the section of our marketplace where we offer premium content (i.e., for purchase), may not yield the strategic goals and objectives that we envision.

Although we believe that Zedge Premium will act as an important driver in helping our platform become a leading platform for professional artists, individual creators and brands looking to distribute their work to consumers looking for an easy, entertaining and unique way to express their voice, individuality and essence, it’s premature to conclude this as being the case.

Although Zedge Premium’s gross transaction revenue has shown modest growth it is still too early to state with conviction that Zedge Premium will have a materially positive impact on our business. In order to do so, we still need, among other things, to:

If Zedge Premium fails to yield the strategic goals and objectives that we envision, our business, results of operations and financial condition will be materially and adversely affected.

We may fail to develop popular new features or expand into new verticals, successfully, negatively impacting our ability to attract new users or retain existing users, which could negatively impact our business, financial condition, and result of operations.

If we fail to maintain and enhance our various brands, or if we incur excessive expenses in this effort, our business, results of operations and prospects may be materially and adversely affected.

We believe that maintaining and enhancing our various digital brands and associated reputation is important to the success of our business. Historically, we have not made material investments in this effort. We believe that a well-recognized and respected brand is important to increasing the number of users and enhancing our attractiveness to users, artists, advertisers and business partners. Brand recognition and enhancement may directly affect our ability to maintain our market position.

Many factors, some of which are beyond our control, are important to maintaining and enhancing our various brands and may negatively impact our brand and reputation if not properly managed, such as our ability to:

In the future, we may conduct various marketing and brand promotion activities to expand our brand. Some of these may require material investment. We cannot assure you, however, that these activities will be successful or that we will be able to achieve the brand promotion effect we expect. In addition, any negative publicity in relation to our mobile internet products, websites or services could harm our brand and reputation.

We have received, and expect to continue to receive, complaints from users regarding the quality of our products and services. If our users’ complaints are not addressed to their satisfaction, our reputation and our market position could be significantly harmed, which may materially and adversely affect our business, revenues and profitability.

The market prices of many digital assets, including NFTs, have experienced significant declines in recent periods and may continue to do so. Further declines in the market prices of digital assets could have a material adverse effect on our NFTs Made Easy offering, our financial performance, and results of our operations.

The market prices of many digital assets, including NFTs, experienced significant declines in the fourth quarter of 2021 and to date in 2022. Despite the increased popularity of NFTs in 2021, sales volumes of NFTs declined consistently throughout 2022, dropping by as much as 60% in the third quarter of 2022 as compared to the previous quarter, according to some market analysts. Further declines in the market prices of digital assets, could have a material adverse effect on our NFTs Made Easy offerings, our financial performance, and results of our operations.

The value of NFTs is uncertain and may subject us to unforeseeable risks.

We allow our creators to offer NFTs for sale. NFTs are unique, one-of-a-kind, or limited series, digital assets made possible by certain digital asset network protocols. Because of their non-fungible nature, NFTs introduce digital scarcity and have become popular as online “collectibles,” similar to physical rare collectible items, such as trading cards or art. Like real world collectibles, the value of NFTs may be prone to “boom and bust” cycles as popularity increases and subsequently subsides. If any of these bust cycles were to occur, it could adversely affect the value of certain of our future strategies.

The prices of digital assets are extremely volatile, and such volatility may have a material adverse effect on our NFTs Made Easy offering.

The market prices of many digital assets, including NFTs, have experienced extreme volatility in recent periods and may continue to do so. For instance, there were steep increases in the value of certain digital assets over the course of 2017, and multiple market observers asserted that digital assets were experiencing a “bubble.” These increases were followed by steep drawdowns throughout 2018 in digital asset trading prices. These drawdowns notwithstanding, digital asset prices, increased significantly again during 2019, decreased significantly again in the first quarter of 2020 amidst broader market declines as a result of the novel coronavirus outbreak and increased significantly again over the remainder of 2020 and the first quarter of 2021. Digital asset prices continued to experience significant and sudden changes throughout 2021 followed by steep drawdowns in the fourth quarter of 2021 and 2022.  

Extreme volatility in the future could have a material adverse effect on the value of NFTs Made Easy offering. Furthermore, negative perception, a lack of stability and standardized regulation in the digital asset economy may reduce confidence in the digital asset economy and may result in greater volatility in the price of NFTs and other digital assets, including a depreciation in value.

RISKS RELATED TO FINANCIAL AND ACCOUNTING MATTERS

Our limited operating history makes it difficult to evaluate our business with past results not necessarily being indicative for future operating results and may increase your investment risk.

We have only a limited operating history, especially with respect to Emojipedia and GuruShots, upon which you can evaluate our business and prospects. Although we experienced impressive year-over-year revenue growth of 36% and 107% in fiscal 2022 and 2021 respectively, our growth in fiscal 2020 was moderate and even declined in fiscal 2019. Impacting the growth figures is the inclusion of GuruShots for all of fiscal 2023 as compared to only the final three and a half months of fiscal 2022. We have encountered and will encounter risks and difficulties frequently experienced by early-stage companies in rapidly evolving industries, like mobile apps, digital marketplaces and gaming, including the need to:

If we do not successfully address any or all of these risks, our business, revenues and profitability could be materially adversely affected.

Although we had positive cash flow from operating activities and net earnings in fiscal 2022 and 2023, we had previously incurred, and may once again incur, net losses and experience negative cash flow from operating activities in the future and may not be able to obtain additional capital in a timely manner or on acceptable terms, or at all.

Our net loss in fiscal 2023 was $6.1 million, our net income in fiscal 2022 was $ 9.7 million, and $8.2 million in fiscal 2021. Our ability to maintain profitability and positive cash flow from operating activities depends on various factors, including but not limited to, the acceptance of our products and services by mobile phone and internet users, the growth and maintenance of our user base, user acquisition spend and associated return, our ability to maintain existing and obtain new advertisers, our ability to grow our revenues, the success of each of our digital brands as measured by their respective key performance indicators, the effectiveness of our new product initiatives, selling and marketing activities as well as control our costs and expenses. We may not be able to sustain profitability or positive cash flow from operating activities, and any such positive cash flow may not be sufficient to satisfy our anticipated capital expenditures and other cash needs. As such, we may not be able to fund our operating expenses and expenditures out of cash flows, which would require us to utilize debt or equity financing which we may not be able to secure or which we may only secure on terms that are not favorable, which may result in significant dilution or voluntary or involuntary dissolution or liquidation proceeding of us and a total loss of your investment.

Debt obligations could adversely affect our ability to raise additional capital or to fund our operations and also exposes us to interest rate risk which could negatively impact our ability to make debt service payments. In addition, we are subject to obligations and restrictive covenants under our loan from Western Alliance Bank that may curtail our ability to operate or which we may not be able to maintain compliance with.

We maintain a loan facility with Western Alliance Bank with a new term loan facility in the maximum principal amount of $2,000,000 for a four-year term and a $4,000,000 revolving credit facility for a two-year term.

Our indebtedness could have important consequences for us, including, but not limited to, the following:

In addition, our credit agreement contains financial and restrictive covenants that limit our ability to engage in activities that may be in our long-term best interest, including our ability to, among other things:

Our failure to comply with those covenants could result in an event of default which, if not cured or waived, could result in the acceleration of substantially all of our indebtedness. In the event of such default, the Bank could elect to terminate their commitments thereunder, cease making further loans and institute foreclosure proceedings against our assets, and we could be forced into bankruptcy or liquidation.

Changes in accounting principles or their application could result in accounting charges or effects which could adversely affect our operating results and prospects.

We prepare consolidated financial statements in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States. The accounting for our business is subject to change based on how the business model evolves, interpretation of various accounting principles, enforcement of existing or new regulations, and changes in policies, rules, regulations, and interpretations, of accounting and financial reporting requirements of the SEC or other regulatory agencies. A change in any of these principles or in their interpretations or application to our business, may have a significant effect on our reported results, as well as our processes and related controls, and may retroactively affect previously reported periods, which may negatively impact our financial statements our business prospects. It is difficult to predict the impact of future changes to accounting principles and accounting policies over financial reporting, any of which could adversely affect our results of operations and financial condition and could require significant investment in systems and personnel.

If our estimates or judgments relating to our critical accounting policies are based on assumptions that change or prove to be incorrect, our operating results could suffer and lower the expectations of equity analysts and investors, resulting in a decline in the market price of our common stock.

Our preparation of financial statements in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States requires us to make certain estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amount of assets and liabilities and the disclosure of contingent liabilities as of the date of the financial statements and the reported amount of revenues and expenses during the reporting period. For example, we make certain assumptions about the interpretation of these principles and accounting treatment of our useful lives of tangible and intangible assets, fair value of contingent consideration, and allowance for credit losses. If these assumptions turn out to be incorrect, the outcomes may be materially higher or lower than expected for current and future periods, which could have a material adverse effect on our reported earnings. We base estimates and assumptions on historical experience, research, and on other factors that we believe to be reasonable and in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States, the results of which form the basis for making judgments about the carrying values of assets, liabilities, equity, revenue and expenses that are not accessible from alternative sources. We also may make estimates regarding activities for which the accounting treatment is still evolving. Actual results may differ from those estimates. If our assumptions change or if actual circumstances differ from our assumptions, our operating results may be adversely affected and could negatively impact investors, resulting in a decline in the market price of our common stock.

Changes in tax laws, tax rates or tax rulings, or the examination of our tax positions, could materially affect our financial condition, effective tax rate, future profitability and results of operations.

Tax laws may change as new laws are passed and new interpretations of the law are issued or applied. Our existing corporate structure and intercompany arrangements have been implemented in a manner that we believe comply with current prevailing tax laws. However, the tax positions that we take advantage of could be undermined due to changing tax laws, both in the United States and in other applicable jurisdictions, including Norway, Lithuania, and Israel. In addition, the tax authorities in the United States and other jurisdictions in which we operate regularly examine income and other tax returns and we expect that they may examine our income and other tax returns. The ultimate outcome of these examinations may not benefit our business.

Our effective tax rate for fiscal 2023 was 7.0% compared and 16.3% for fiscal 2022. In general, changes in applicable U.S. federal and state and foreign tax laws and regulations, or their interpretation and application, including the possibility of retroactive effect, could affect our tax expense. In addition, and in response to significant market volatility and disruptions to business operations resulting from the global spread of COVID-19, taxing authorities in many jurisdictions in which we operate may propose changes to their tax laws and regulations. These potential changes could have a material impact on our effective tax rate, long-term tax planning and financial results. 

Over the last several years, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has been working on a Base Erosion and Profits Shifting Project that, if implemented, would change various aspects of the existing framework under which our tax obligations are determined in many of the countries in which we do business. In 2021, more than 140 countries tentatively signed on to a framework that imposes a minimum tax rate of 15%, among other provisions. As this framework is subject to further negotiation and implementation by each member country, the timing and ultimate impact of any such changes on our tax obligations are uncertain. Similarly, the European commission and several countries have issued proposals that would apply to various aspects of the current tax framework under which we are taxed. These proposals include changes to the existing framework to calculate income tax, as well as proposals to change or impose new types of non-income taxes, including taxes based on a percentage of revenue. For example, several jurisdictions have proposed or enacted taxes applicable to digital services, which includes business activities on digital advertising and online marketplaces, and which may apply to our business.

Effective January 1, 2022, pursuant to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, R&D expenses are required to be capitalized and amortized for US tax purposes, which will delay the deductibility of these expenses and potentially increase the amount of cash taxes we pay.

We are exposed to fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates.

We have significant operations in Europe and Israel that are denominated in foreign currencies, primarily the Norwegian Krone, Euro and Israel Shekel, subjecting us to foreign currency risk. The strengthening or weakening of the U.S. Dollar versus these currencies impacts the expenses generated in these foreign currencies when converted into the U.S. Dollar. In fiscal 2023 and fiscal 2022, we recorded a gain of $36,000 and a loss of $281,000, respectively, from foreign currency movements relative to the U.S. Dollar. Included in these amounts were gains from hedging activities of $14,000 and losses of $368,000 in fiscal 2023 and fiscal 2022, respectively. While we regularly enter into transactions to hedge portions of our foreign currency exposure, it is impossible to predict or eliminate the effects of this exposure. Fluctuations in foreign exchange rates could significantly impact our financial results.

If we fail to implement and maintain an effective system of internal controls over financial reporting, we may be unable to accurately report our results of operations, meet our reporting obligations or prevent fraud.

Under Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, we are required to include a report of management on our internal control over financial reporting in our annual report on Form 10-K. In addition, should we become an accelerated filer, our independent registered public accounting firm must attest to and report on the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting. Our management may conclude that our internal control over financial reporting is not effective. Moreover, even if our management concludes that our internal control over financial reporting is effective, our independent registered public accounting firm, after conducting its own independent testing, may issue a report that is qualified if it is not satisfied with our internal controls or the level at which our controls are documented, designed, operated or reviewed, or if it interprets the relevant requirements differently from us. In addition, our reporting obligations may place a significant strain on our management, operational and financial resources and systems for the foreseeable future. We may be unable to timely complete our evaluation testing and any required remediation.

During the course of documenting and testing our internal control procedures, in order to satisfy the requirements of Section 404, we may identify weaknesses and deficiencies in our internal control over financial reporting. In addition, if we fail to maintain the adequacy of our internal control over financial reporting, as these standards are modified, supplemented or amended from time to time, we may not be able to conclude on an ongoing basis that we have effective internal control over financial reporting in accordance with Section 404. If we fail to achieve and maintain an effective internal control environment, we could suffer material misstatements in our financial statements and fail to meet our reporting obligations, and we may be required to restate our financial statements from prior periods, any of which would likely cause investors to lose confidence in our reported financial information. This could in turn limit our access to capital markets, harm our results of operations, and lead to a decline in the trading price of our stock.

Additionally, ineffective internal control over financial reporting could expose us to increased risk of fraud or misuse of corporate assets and subject us to potential delisting from the stock exchange on which we list, regulatory investigations and civil or criminal sanctions.

RISKS RELATED TO OUR OPERATIONS

We may not be able to effectively manage our growth or implement our future business strategies, in which case our business and results of operations may be materially and adversely affected.

Our continued success depends on our ability to effectively and efficiently grow each of the properties in our brand portfolio.

We may not be capable of growing our business organically or with paid marketing campaigns, attract new players and artists and/or establish cooperation with strategic partners. Our business has experienced periods of rapid growth and expansion that has placed, and continues to place, significant strain on our management and resources. We cannot assure you that these periods will recur or be sustainable. We have also acquired other companies and made asset purchases and integrating those into Zedge has placed and continues to place significant strain on management and resources. We believe that continued growth of our business will depend on our ability to successfully develop and enhance our products and services, cost efficiently attract new artists and individual creators, maintain our relationship with various artists and content partners like Google, Meta and Apple, sustain our high rankings with the leading search engines including Google, capture the changes that are taking place in the industry in a timely fashion grow our user base, retain existing users, continue developing innovative technologies in response to user demand, increase brand awareness through marketing and promotional activities, react to changes in market trends, expand into new market segments, attract new advertisers, retain existing advertisers, get users to engage with our digital properties and convert into paying users or subscribers, and take advantage of the growth in the relevant markets. We cannot assure you that we will achieve any or all of the above. In the event that we are not successful in some or all of these areas we may not be able to retain our customers and advertisers.

We need to invest in paid user acquisition in order to grow our customer base. However, we may not be able to secure new users at scale with a positive return on investment. Even if we can secure new profitable customers these customers may not mature into sustainable long-term customers.

To manage our growth and for us to attain and maintain profitability, we will also need to further expand, train, manage and motivate our workforce across multiple geographies and manage our relationships with users, consultants, business partners and advertisers globally. We anticipate that we will need to implement a variety of enhanced and upgraded operational and financial systems, procedures and controls, including the improvement of our accounting and other internal management systems. All of these endeavors involve risks and will require substantial management efforts and skills and additional expenditures.

Our products currently enjoy a global customer base. This geographic diversity may raise the level of difficulty in managing future growth and profitability. We cannot assure you that our current and planned personnel, systems, procedures and controls will be adequate to support our future operations. In addition, we cannot assure you that we will be able to effectively manage our growth or implement our future business strategies effectively, and failure to do so may materially and adversely affect our business and results of operations.

During the past five years, we have experienced a shift in our Zedge App’s regional customer make-up with the portion of our total MAU from emerging markets increasing, and the portion from well-developed markets decreasing. In fiscal 2023, our Zedge App’s users in emerging markets declined by 2.4% while its users in well-developed regions declined 6.8% when compared to fiscal 2022. India comprised 28% of our MAU as of July 31, 2023. This shift has negatively impacted revenues because well-developed markets command materially higher advertising rates when compared to those in emerging markets. Although we are investing in reversing this trend, we may not be successful in this effort which may result in lower revenues and profitability. 

In 2021 Apple released iOS 14 which started requiring users to opt in to share their identifier for advertisers IDFA with app developers. Apple’s IDFA is a unique string of alphanumeric characters assigned to Apple devices which advertisers use to identify app users in order to deliver personalized and targeted advertising. According to Statista the worldwide opt-in rate enabling app tracking after the release of iOS 14 was less than 25%. As a consequence, the ability of advertisers to accurately target and measure their advertising campaigns at the user level has become significantly more difficult typically resulting in higher user acquisition costs.

Our products may contain errors, flaws or failures that may only become apparent after their release. From time to time, we receive user feedback in connection with errors, flaws or failures and such errors, flaws or failures may also come to our attention during our internal testing process. We generally have been able to resolve such errors, flaws or failures in a timely manner, but we cannot assure you that we will be able to detect and resolve all of them effectively or in a timely manner. Errors, flaws or failures in our services and products may adversely affect user experience and cause our users to stop using our services and products, which could materially and adversely affect our business and results of operations.

Our marketing efforts to acquire new, and retain existing, customers may not be effective or cost-efficient, and may be affected by external factors beyond our control.

Maintaining and promoting awareness of our services is important to our ability to attract and retain customers. We spend a significant amount on marketing activities to acquire new customers and retain and engage existing customers and have plans to maintain and increase that focus. For example, in 2023, and 2022 our marketing expenses were approximately $3.2 million and $0.9 million, respectively, and we expect our marketing expenses to continue to account for a significant portion of our operating expenses. Our business depends on a high degree of app installs from the app stores and website traffic, which is dependent on many factors, including the availability of appealing website content and search engine optimization (“SEO”), affiliate marketing and display advertising, as well as social media and email. The marketing efforts we implement may not succeed for a variety of reasons, including our inability to execute and implement our plans. External factors beyond our control may also impact the success of our marketing initiatives.

Our digital presence heavily depends on search engine traffic, primarily from platforms like Google. A key driver of our success in this domain is our website’s visibility and ranking in response to search queries. As search engines frequently update their algorithms, affecting our link placements and rankings we need to regularly manage our search engine optimization in order to avoid a material decrease in web traffic to our online properties. Substituting free traffic with paid alternatives could also lead to increased costs. These risks highlight the critical importance of continuous adaptation to the evolving search engine landscape and the potential consequences if we do not adequately navigate these challenges.

User acquisition of our apps depends on a host of items including and especially on paid and organic app marketing initiatives. Effective and profitable user acquisition relies on knowing how to optimize across each acquisition platform, data analysis, creatives, amongst other things. In addition, due to the changing nature of what data the platforms provide to publishers like Zedge may result in elongating testing time windows and increasing testing budgets. Taken together if we are unsuccessful in accounting for all of these items, we may be unable to recover our marketing spend and we may not acquire new customers or our cost to acquire new customers may increase, and our existing customers may reduce the frequency or size of their purchases from us, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business, prospects, results of operations, financial condition or cash flows.

Our products face competition in all aspects of its business. If our apps fail to compete effectively or if their reputation is damaged, our business, financial condition and results of operations may be materially and adversely affected.

Although our products are leaders in their specific verticals, including mobile phone personalization, emoji related content and information, and digital photo competitions, we cannot guarantee that our brands will be able to maintain their leadership position. Our products face potential competition from other internet companies, app developers and smartphone manufacturers, and new market entrants may also emerge. If we are not able to differentiate our products from that of our competitors, drive value for our customers, and/or effectively align our resources with our goals and objectives, we may not be able to compete effectively against our competitors. Our failure to compete effectively against any of the foregoing competitive threats could materially and adversely harm our business. Increased competition may result in new products and offerings which may in turn require us to take actions to retain and attract our users and advertisers in such a fashion which would lower our gross margins. If we fail to compete effectively, our market share would decrease and our results from operations, revenues and profits would be materially and adversely affected.

We are attempting to expand our Zedge Premium marketplace where professional artists, individual creators and brands offer their content to our users. We aspire to be a popular destination that users turn to when looking for high quality digital content. If we are unsuccessful in meeting our goal, our business may suffer resulting in diluting our value proposition, losing MAU and having lower revenues and profits.

If we are not able to effectively compete in any aspect of our business or if our reputation is harmed by rumors or allegations regarding our business or business practices, our overall user base may decline, making it less attractive to advertisers. We may be required to spend additional resources to further increase our brand recognition and promote our products and services, and such additional spending could adversely affect our profitability.

If we fail to keep up with rapid technological changes in the internet and smartphone industries and adapt our products and services accordingly, our results of operations and future growth may be adversely affected.

The internet and smartphone industries are characterized by rapid and innovative technological changes. Our future success will depend, in part, on our ability to respond to fast changing technologies, adapt our products and services to evolving industry standards and improve the performance, functionality and reliability of our products and services. Our failure to continue to adapt to such changes could harm our business. If we are slow to develop products and services that are compatible with smartphones, or if the products and services we develop are not widely accepted and used by smartphone users, we may not be able to capture a significant share of this important market. In addition, the widespread adoption of new internet, networking or telecommunications technologies or other technological changes for smartphones could require substantial expenditures to modify or adapt our products, services or infrastructure. If we fail to keep up with rapid and innovative technological changes to remain competitive, our future growth may be materially and adversely affected and our results of operations could be materially and adversely affected.

Our international operations expose us to additional risks that could harm our business, operating results and financial condition.

In addition to uncertainty about our ability to continue expanding and monetizing internationally, our foreign operations may subject us to additional risks including:

Further, our ability to expand successfully in foreign jurisdictions involves other risks, including challenges in integrating foreign operations, risks associated with entering jurisdictions in which we may have little experience and the day-to-day management of a growing and increasingly geographically diverse company. We may not realize the operating efficiencies, competitive advantages or financial results that we anticipate from our investments in foreign jurisdictions. In addition, our international business operations could be interrupted and negatively impacted by terrorist activity, war, political unrest or other economic or political uncertainties. Moreover, foreign jurisdictions could impose tariffs, quotas, trade barriers and other similar restrictions on our international sales.

We are subject to numerous and sometimes conflicting U.S. and foreign laws and regulations that increase our cost of doing business. Violations of these complex laws and regulations that apply to our international operations could result in damages, awards, fines, litigation, criminal actions, sanctions, or penalties against us, our officers or our employees, prohibitions on the conduct of our business and our ability to offer products and services, and damage to our reputation. Although we have implemented policies and procedures designed to promote compliance with these laws, there can be no assurance that our employees, contractors, or agents will not violate our policies or that our policies will be sufficient. These risks inherent in our international operations and expansion increase our costs of doing business internationally and could result in material harm to our business, operating results, and financial condition.

Conditions in Israel, including the recent attack by Hamas and other terrorist organizations from the Gaza Strip and Israel’s war against them, may adversely affect our operations.

Because a portion of our operations are conducted in Israel and certain members of our board of directors and management, as well as a many of our employees and consultants, are located in Israel, our business and operations are directly affected by economic, political, geopolitical and military conditions affecting Israel. Since the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, a number of armed conflicts have occurred between Israel and its neighboring countries and other hostile non-state actors. These conflicts have involved missile strikes, hostile infiltrations and terrorism against civilian targets in various parts of Israel, which have negatively affected business conditions in Israel.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas militants and members of other terrorist organizations infiltrated Israel’s southern border from the Gaza Strip and conducted a series of terror attacks on civilian and military targets. Thereafter, these terrorists launched extensive rocket attacks on Israeli population and industrial centers located along the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip. As of the date of this registration statement, such attacks collectively resulted in thousands of deaths and injuries, in addition to the kidnapping of a currently indefinite number of civilians, including women and children. Shortly following the attack, Israel’s security cabinet declared war against Hamas.

The intensity and duration of Israel’s current war against Hamas is difficult to predict, and as are such war’s economic implications on the Company’s business and operations.

It is possible that other terrorist organizations will join the hostilities as well, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Palestinian military organizations in the West Bank.

As a result of the Israeli security cabinet’s decision to declare war against Hamas, several hundred thousand Israeli reservists were drafted to perform immediate military service. Certain of our employees and consultants in Israel have been mobilized for service in the current war against Hamas as of the date of this report, and such persons are expected may be absent for an extended period of time. As a result, our operations, including the development and launch of additional products, may be disrupted by such absences, which may materially and adversely affect our business and results of operations.

Prior to the Hamas attack in October 2023, the Israeli government pursued extensive changes to Israel’s judicial system, which sparked extensive political debate and unrest. In response to such initiative, many individuals, organizations and institutions, both within and outside of Israel, have voiced concerns that the proposed changes may negatively impact the business environment in Israel including due to reluctance of foreign investors to invest or transact business in Israel as well as to increased currency fluctuations, downgrades in credit rating, increased interest rates, increased volatility in security markets, and other changes in macroeconomic conditions. The risk of such negative developments has increased in light of the recent Hamas attacks and the war against Hamas declared by Israel. To the extent that any of these negative developments do occur, they may have an adverse effect on our business and our results of operations.

In addition, recent political uprisings and conflicts in various countries in the Middle East, including Syria, are affecting the political stability of those countries. In addition, the threats that Iran and various extremist groups in the region make against Israel may escalate in the future and turn violent, which could affect the Israeli economy in general and us in particular. Any armed conflicts, terrorist activities or political instability in the region could adversely affect business conditions, harm our results of operations and make it harder for us to raise capital.

For the most part, we do not have commercial insurance that cover losses that may occur as a result of an event associated with the security situation in either of these locations. Although the Israeli government has in the past covered the reinstatement value of certain damages that were caused by terrorist attacks or acts of war, we cannot assure you that this government coverage will be maintained or, if maintained, will be sufficient to compensate us fully for damages incurred. Any losses or damages incurred would likely cause a significant disruption in our employees’ lives and possibly put their lives at risk, which would have a material adverse effect on our operations. Any armed conflicts or political instability in the region would likely negatively affect business conditions generally and could harm our results of operations.

Additionally, in the past, the State of Israel and Israeli companies have been subjected to economic boycotts. Several countries still restrict business with the State of Israel and with Israeli companies. These restrictive laws and policies may have an adverse impact on our results of operations, financial conditions or the expansion of our business. A campaign of boycotts, divestment and sanctions has been undertaken against Israel, which could also adversely impact our business.

We have offices and other significant operations located in Lithuania, Israel, and Norway, and, therefore, our results may be adversely affected by political, economic and military instability in these countries.

The overwhelming majority of our employees are located in Lithuania, Israel, and Norway and many of our senior managers live in Israel or Lithuania. For those that reside in Israel and Lithuania political, economic and military conditions directly affect our business. Any hostilities involving these countries or the interruption or curtailment of trade between these countries and their trading partners could adversely affect our business and results of operations. Furthermore, there is always the chance that the citizens in these countries will be required to serve in the army or perform public duty in the event of an armed conflict.

The State of Israel is currently at war with Hamas, a terrorist organization that controls the Gaza Strip and has had various armed conflicts with its neighbors as well as terrorist acts committed within Israel by hostile elements. In addition, Hezbollah, another terrorist organization based in Lebanon has been indiscriminately shelling Israel.

The Republic of Lithuania borders both the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad and the Republic of Belarus, who are aligned in Russia’s illegal invasion of the Ukraine. This places Lithuania at a higher risk of military conflict, may negatively impact the ability to travel to and from Lithuania, and may damage the economy. This action also negatively impacted GuruShots because it utilizes a small number of outsourced contractors based in the Ukraine. This resulted in temporarily disrupting the work product associated with these contractors at the outset of the war.

Companies and governmental agencies may restrict access to our website or mobile apps, or the internet generally, which could lead to the loss or slower growth of our user base, in which case our business and results of operations may be materially and adversely affected.

In order to grow our business, users need to access the internet and, in particular, our digital products. Companies and governmental agencies could block access to our websites and apps or the internet generally. For example, in 2013 the Indian courts issued orders restraining internet service providers from providing access to various internet domains including ours. Access to our Zedge App through any mode was blocked in many parts of India from February 2013 until August 2019 and there can be no guaranties that this will not recur or happen elsewhere. If companies or governmental entities block or limit access to our Zedge App or otherwise adopt policies restricting access to our advertiser’s products and services our business could be negatively impacted resulting in a loss or slow-down of user growth and/or revenues.

Our core values of focusing on our users and acting for the long-term may conflict with the short-term interests of our business.

One of our core values is providing an excellent user experience, which we believe is essential to our success and serves the best, long-term interests of us and our stockholders. Therefore, we have made, in the past and/or may make in the future, significant investments or changes in strategy that we think will benefit our users, even if our decision negatively impacts our operating results in the short term. In addition, our philosophy of prioritizing our users may cause disagreements or negatively impact our relationships with advertisers or other third parties. Our decisions may not result in the long-term benefits that we expect, in which case the success of our business and operating results could be materially harmed.

If we are unable to attract and retain highly qualified employees, we may not be able to grow effectively.

Our ability to compete and grow depends in large part on the efforts and talents of our employees. Such employees, particularly product managers, designers and engineers, are in high demand, and we devote significant resources to identifying, hiring, training, and successfully integrating and retaining these employees. The loss of employees or the inability to hire additional skilled employees as necessary could result in significant disruptions to our business, and the integration of replacement personnel could be time-consuming and expensive and cause additional disruptions to our business.

We operate a development center in Vilnius, Lithuania. If we are unable to recruit and retain well qualified candidates at an attractive rate or manage them well, our business will struggle to meet our development goals and objectives. In fiscal 2021 we adopted a “remote-first” work policy that enabled employees to work from home unless they were needed in the office. In fiscal 2023 we changed this policy to a hybrid model requiring most employees to work from the office several days a week. Although this policy has been well received by employees, it is as of yet unclear whether it will be further revised.

In April of 2022 we completed the acquisition of GuruShots Ltd, an Israeli based company. GuruShots utilized a small number of outsourced contractors based in the Ukraine. Russia’s illegal invasion of the Ukraine in February 2022 resulted in temporarily disrupting the work product associated with these contractors. Furthermore, Zedge employees situated in Vilnius were distracted due to the proximity to the Belarusian border and uncertainty related to Belarus’ complicity with Russia’s illegal action and associated intent. In addition, consumer prices have risen materially throughout the Eurozone leaving uncertainty about how this may impact employment costs in the future.

In October of 2023 Hamas, a designated terrorist organization, launched a savage terror attack in Israel along with launching thousands of rockets into Israeli sovereign territory. The State of Israel declared war against Hamas resulting in the mobilization of more than 300,000 army reserve. In addition, Hezbollah, another designated terrorist organization, based in Lebanon, has been indiscriminately shelling Israeli territory. Some GuruShots employees were impacted and the regular and consistent rocket barrage is taking a toll on productivity. Coupled with this, most, if not all, schools are along with our office closed making the work environment complex. It remains unclear how long this conflict will continue and what the impact on productivity will be.

We believe that two critical components of our success are our ability to retain our best people by preserving our culture and maintaining competitive compensation practices. As we continue to grow rapidly, and we develop the infrastructure of a public company, we may find it difficult to maintain our entrepreneurial, execution-focused culture. In addition, depending on the performance of our stock price some of our employees are able to receive material proceeds from sales of our equity in the public markets, which may reduce their motivation to continue to work for us.

We rely on third parties to provide the technologies, including cloud services, necessary to deliver content, advertising, and services to our users, and any change in the licensing terms, costs, availability, or acceptance of these formats and technologies could materially adversely affect our business.

Our service and hosting providers may experience downtime from time to time, which may negatively affect our brand and user perception of the reliability of our service. Any scheduled or unscheduled interruptions in service could result in an immediate, and possibly substantial, loss of revenues. Although we seek to reduce the possibility of disruptions or other outages, our websites and apps may be disrupted by problems relating either to our own technology or third-party technology that is used for them. Our systems may be vulnerable to damage or interruption from telecommunication failures, power loss, computer attacks or viruses, earthquakes, floods, fires, terrorist attacks and similar events. Parts of our system are not fully redundant or backed up, and our disaster recovery planning may not be sufficient for all eventualities. Despite any precaution we may take, the occurrence of a natural disaster or other unanticipated problems at our hosting facilities could result in lengthy interruptions in the availability of our products. Any interruption in the ability of users to access our websites or apps could reduce our future revenues, harm our future profits, subject us to regulatory scrutiny and lead users to seek alternative internet mobile products.

There can be no assurance that these providers will continue licensing their technologies or intellectual property to us on reasonable terms, or at all. Providers may change the fees they charge users or otherwise change their business model in a manner that slows the widespread acceptance of their technologies. Any change in the licensing terms, costs, availability, or user acceptance of these technologies could materially and adversely affect our business, revenues and profitability.

In January 2022, AppLovin a mobile technology company that enables developers of all sizes to market, monetize, analyze and publish their apps through its mobile advertising, marketing, and analytics platforms consummated the acquisition of mobile monetization company MoPub from X, formerly known as Twitter. MoPub had been our ad mediation platform for the past ten years. At the time of the acquisition, AppLovin announced that it would deprecate MoPub’s mediation platform. This resulted in Zedge needing to migrate to a different mediation platform. This unanticipated migration required material resource and time investment that delayed the delivery of other product initiatives we had planned for.

We track certain key performance indicators with internal and third-party tools and do not independently verify that all of this data is accurate. Certain of these indicators may have challenges in being tracked accurately which could result in real or perceived inaccuracies that could negatively impact our business.

We track certain key performance indicators, including daily active users, monthly active users, purchasers, and paying subscribers using both internal and third-party tracking tools. Our analytical tools have certain limitations, including those from third-party providers, and our ability to access and monitor this data may change, which would adversely impact our ability to track these KPIs. If the internal or external tools we use to track data contain bugs we may make poor decisions, especially when it comes to paid user acquisition, based on flawed and inaccurate data which can hurt our reputation and financial position.

We use open-source software in our platform that may subject our technology to general release or require us to re-engineer our solutions, which may cause materially harm to our business.

We use open-source software in connection with our services. From time to time, companies that incorporate open-source software into their products have faced claims challenging the ownership of open-source software and/or compliance with open-source license terms. Therefore, we could be subject to lawsuits by parties claiming ownership of what we believe to be open-source software or noncompliance with open-source licensing terms. Some open-source software licenses require users who distribute or make available open-source software as part of their software to publicly disclose all or part of the source code to such software and/or make available any derivative works of the open-source code on unfavorable terms or at no cost. While we monitor our use of open source software and try to ensure that none is used in a manner that would require us to disclose the source code or that would otherwise breach the terms of an open-source agreement, such use could nevertheless occur and we may be required to release our proprietary source code, pay damages for breach of contract, re-engineer our applications, discontinue use in the event re-engineering cannot be accomplished on a timely basis or take other remedial action that may divert resources away from our development efforts, any of which could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition or operating results.

Our business, results of operation and financial condition could be adversely affected by the Covid 19 pandemic, other global epidemics and the restrictions put in place in connection therewith and/or the loosening of such restrictions could adversely impact our business.

Pandemics, epidemics, medical emergencies and other public health crises outside of our control could have a negative impact on our business. Large-scale medical emergencies can take many forms and result in widespread business interruptions due to illness and death. For example, in December 2019, a strain of coronavirus surfaced in Wuhan, China soon evolving into a global pandemic without proven medical treatments or vaccines for prevention. When vaccines started to become available demand for the vaccines exceeded the supply in the countries in which we operate. Furthermore, the vaccines were not fully effective in preventing illness. All of these factors introduced challenges in operating our business including the productivity of our employees and third-party vendors that we depend on while adjusting to shelter-in-place and health regulations. We also had to comply with an assortment of regulations specific to returning to our offices, creating additional uncertainty and confusion.

Widespread pandemics, epidemics or other health crises could result in significant market volatility, regionally or globally. Furthermore, health crises may disrupt or negatively impact behaviors of large numbers of users or potential users due to either mandated stay at home orders or the lifting of such orders or non-mandated changes in consumer behavior. These changes are almost impossible to predict and could either serve to accelerate, slow down or make user behavior more volatile which could negatively impact our operating results.

In the event of a new coronavirus surge or other health emergency we plan to execute to the best of our ability recognizing that the nature and scope of the crisis may result in delays or changes to our goals and initiatives.

Our business is subject to economic, market, and geopolitical conditions as well as to cyber-attacks and natural disasters beyond our control.

Our business is subject to economic, market, and geopolitical conditions, as well as natural disasters beyond our control and as a result we may experience a slowdown or cessation in customer growth, interruptions or delays in the services or a downturn in user. Further, our revenue is driven in part by discretionary consumer spending habits and by advertising spend. Historically, consumer purchasing and advertising spend have each declined during economic downturns and periods of economic or geopolitical uncertainty or when disposable income or consumer lending declines. Macro-economic conditions, such as a recession or economic slowdown in well developed markets, specifically, and emerging markets, more generally may result in uncertainty and adversely affect discretionary consumer spending habits and preferences as well as advertising spend. Uncertain economic conditions may also adversely affect our vendors making it virtually impossible to grow in the event of future economic malaise. We are particularly susceptible to market conditions and risks associated with the mobile app ecosystem, which also include the popularity, price, and timing of our apps, changes in user demographics, the availability and popularity of other forms of entertainment. Furthermore, critical reviews and general tastes and preferences may change quickly and without prior warning.

A key component of our growth strategy involves the adoption and utilization of artificial intelligence (AI), which introduces certain risks.

We currently incorporate AI into specific existing and planned products, as well as our internal operations. For instance, in fiscal 2023, we launched pAInt, a generative AI wallpaper maker within the Zedge App, and we are in the midst of a soft launch of a new mobile game, AI Art Master, which enables players to create generative AI images and compete in themed based competitions with these images. While AI offers substantial opportunities, it also carries inherent risks.

Our competitors may possess greater financial and technological resources, providing them with a competitive edge in attracting, motivating, and retaining top AI professionals. This could pose challenges in building and maintaining our AI capabilities.

Furthermore, the use of AI brings to the forefront emerging ethical concerns. Should we introduce solutions that generate content that is misleading, biased, harmful or controversial due to perceived or actual societal impact, we may face potential harm to our brand and reputation, competitive disadvantages, or even legal liabilities.

In addition, we are susceptible to competitive risks arising from the rapid adoption and integration of new technologies by established industry participants, emerging startups, and other market entrants. Over time, AI tools are likely to enhance their accuracy and ability to handle complex tasks, potentially disrupting the landscape for educational technology businesses like ours. We must remain vigilant in our efforts to predict and respond to these developments in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Moreover, staying compliant with evolving laws, regulations, and industry standards pertaining to AI may impose significant operational costs and constrain our ability to develop, deploy, or employ AI technologies. Failing to adapt appropriately to this evolving regulatory environment could result in legal liability, regulatory actions, and damage to our brand and reputation.

Our ongoing development and use of generative AI tools may result in copyright infringement claims, disputes over ownership and licensing, and potential patent infringement claims, among other things. These legal challenges could be costly to defend against, leading to substantial financial obligations and reputational damage. The evolving regulatory environment and uncertain legal precedents in this field further increase our exposure to litigation risks, which could materially affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Failure to detect or prevent fraudulent activities on our platform could cause users to lose confidence in our products and harm our business.

We may be subject to fraudulent and/or malicious activities undertaken by persons seeking to use our platform for improper purposes. Examples of such activities include the use of bots or other automated or manual mechanisms to generate fraudulent activity through our platform, which could generate revenue for the perpetrators and involve our platform in their improper activity. Detecting fraudulent or malicious activity can be difficult. Although we have implemented measures to detect and reduce the occurrence of fraudulent activities, including click fraud, we cannot guarantee that we will be fully successful in doing so. If we fail to detect or prevent fraudulent or other malicious activity, it may result in dissuading sellers and customers alike from engaging with our products and services. Any actual or alleged future fraudulent activity may damage our reputation, or diminish the value of our brand name, either of which could adversely impact our business, results of operations and financial condition. 

Zedge is exposed to claims from prior owners of GuruShots objecting to the determination that the conditions for payment of the earnout for the first year following acquisition were not met, and that the user acquisition spend obligations that we have made to the sellers of GuruShots are not required.

In connection with the acquisition of GuruShots, the Company has (i) committed to a retention pool of $4 million in cash to be paid to the founders and employees of GuruShots that will be payable over three years from closing of the acquisition based on the beneficiaries thereof remaining employed by the Company or a subsidiary; and (ii) agreed to make certain minimum investments in user acquisition for GuruShots in the period covered by the earnout to be contingently paid to the prior owners of GuruShots subject to GuruShots maintaining agreed upon levels of return on ad spend (ROAS). GuruShots’ financial performance during the period from the April 2022 acquisition through July 31, 2023, was materially impacted by a combination of industry specific, macroeconomic, and geopolitical challenges that contributed to negatively impacting ROAS. The conditions for payment of the earnout for the first year following the acquisition were not met and no earnout payment was made or accrued.

Although we believe that we have acted in compliance with our obligations, we could be exposed to liability to the prior owners of GuruShots. One of the prior owners of GuruShots has objected to the determination that the conditions for payment of the earnout for the first year following acquisition were not met. We responded to the objection in great detail and believe the assertion to be without merit.

Zedge may be unable to successfully integrate GuruShots into Zedge.

Zedge and GuruShots will need to integrate their operations which will require coordination between management, marketing, technology, product development, and operations. Zedge may not execute the integration successfully resulting in higher costs, product delays, employee resignations, and overall underperformance.

The GuruShots acquisition may fail to yield growth opportunities and achieve beneficial synergies.

Zedge acquired GuruShots with the expectation that the transaction will yield growth on a standalone basis as well as strategic synergies on a combined basis. Our success in realizing these growth opportunities and strategic synergies, and their associated timing depends, amongst other things, on the successful integration of the respective businesses. Even if we are successful with the integration, there is no guarantee that the strategic synergies that we envisioned will bear fruit.

Future strategic alliances or acquisitions may not be successful and may have a material and adverse effect on our business, reputation and results of operations.

We may enter into strategic alliances, including joint ventures or minority equity investments, or acquisitions with various third parties to further our business purpose from time to time. These alliances and acquisitions could subject us to a number of risks, including risks associated with sharing proprietary information, non-performance by the third party and increased expenses in establishing new strategic alliances, any of which may materially and adversely affect our business. We may have limited ability to monitor or control the actions of these third parties and, to the extent any of these strategic third parties suffer negative publicity or harm to their reputation from events relating to their business, we may also suffer negative publicity or harm to our reputation by virtue of our association with any such third party.

In addition, if appropriate opportunities arise, we may acquire additional assets, products, technologies or businesses that we believe are complementary to our existing business. Future acquisitions and the subsequent integration of new assets and businesses into our own would require significant attention from our management and could result in a diversion of resources from our existing business, which in turn could have an adverse effect on our business operations. Acquired assets or businesses may not generate the financial results we expect and could require the use of substantial amounts of cash, potentially dilutive issuances of equity securities, the occurrence of significant goodwill impairment charges, amortization expenses for other intangible assets and exposure to potential unknown liabilities of the acquired business. Moreover, the costs of identifying and consummating acquisitions may be significant. In addition to possible stockholders’ approval, we may also have to obtain approvals and licenses from relevant government authorities for the acquisitions and to comply with any applicable laws and regulations, which could result in increased delay and costs.

LEGAL AND REGULATORY RISKS

Legal or regulatory proceedings or allegations of impropriety could have a material adverse impact on our reputation, results of operations, financial condition and liquidity.

We have been party to and in the future may become subject to new legal proceedings in the operation of our business, including, but not limited to, with respect to alleged breaches of consumer privacy regulations, employee matters, alleged service and system malfunctions, alleged intellectual property violations and claims relating to our contracts, licenses and strategic investments. Furthermore, we may be included in lawsuits as third-party defendants due to the use of products or services of the primary defendant. We may also be subject to fraudulent claims from parties like patent trolls.

Additional legal proceedings targeting our products and services and claiming violations of state or federal laws could occur, based on the unique and particular laws of each jurisdiction, particularly as litigation claims and regulations continue to evolve. We cannot predict the outcome of any legal proceedings to which we may be a party, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations, cash flows or financial condition.

As noted above, we have responded to a claim from one of the prior owners of GuruShots, who objected to our determination that the conditions for payment of the earnout for the first year following acquisition were not met. We believe the assertion to be without merit.

A variety of new and existing U.S. and foreign government laws and regulations could subject us to claims, judgments, monetary liabilities and other remedies, and to limitations on our business practices, in which case our business and results of operations may be materially and adversely affected.

We are subject to numerous U.S. and foreign laws and regulations covering a wide variety of subject matters. New laws and regulations, changes in existing laws and regulations or the interpretation of them, our introduction of new products, or an extension of our business into new areas could increase our future compliance costs, make our products and services less attractive to our users, introduce litigation exposure, or cause us to change or limit our business practices. We may incur substantial expenses to comply with laws and regulations or defend against a claim that we have not complied with them. Further, any failure on our part to comply with any relevant laws or regulations may subject us to significant civil or criminal liabilities, penalties, taxes, fees, costs, reputational harm, competitive damage and negative publicity.

The application of existing domestic and international laws and regulations to us relating to issues such as user privacy and data protection, security, defamation, pricing, advertising, taxation, gambling, sweepstakes, promotions, consumer protection, artificial intelligence and machine learning, accessibility, content regulation, quality of services, law enforcement demands, telecommunications, mobile, and intellectual property ownership and infringement in many instances is unclear or unsettled. Further, the application to us or our subsidiaries of existing laws regulating or requiring licenses for certain businesses of our advertisers can be unclear. U.S. export control laws and regulations also impose requirements and restrictions on exports to certain nations and persons and on our business. Internationally, we may also be subject to laws regulating our activities in foreign countries and to foreign laws and regulations that are inconsistent from country to country. Any new legislation, in the U.S. or abroad, may be difficult to comply with in a timely and comprehensive manner and may expose our business to increased costs. If the rules, doctrines or currently available defenses change, if international jurisdictions refuse to apply protections similar to those that are currently available in the U.S. or the EU, or if a court were to disagree with our application of those rules to our solutions, our potential liability for information or content created by third parties and posted to our platform could require us to expend significant resources to try to comply with the new rules and implement additional measures to reduce our exposure to such liability or we could incur liability and our business, financial condition and results of operations could be harmed.

In addition, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the “DMCA”), has provisions that limit, but do not necessarily eliminate, our liability for caching, hosting, listing or linking user-generated materials that infringe copyrights, so long as we comply with the statutory requirements in the DMCA. The Communications Decency Act (the “CDA”) further helps to limit our potential liability for certain content uploaded onto our platform by third parties. For example, Section 230 of the CDA provides immunity from liability for providers of an interactive computer service who publish tortious and otherwise illegal content provided by users of the service. While the immunity provisions of the DMCA and the CDA are well established, there are regular cases seeking to limit the application of such immunity. Various U.S. and international laws restrict the distribution of materials considered harmful to children and impose additional restrictions on the ability of online services to collect information from minors. In the area of data protection, every state has passed a law requiring notification, and at times, the provision of identity theft protection, to users when there is a security breach for personal data. We face similar risks and costs as our products and services are offered in international markets and may be subject to additional regulations.

In many, but not all, territories outside of the U.S. there are laws similar to the DMCA that exempt us from copyright infringement liability that may arise due to hosting user-uploaded materials. In some countries, particularly in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region, these laws are being readjusted and new, and potentially burdensome, constraints are being imposed onto service providers.

In June 2019, the European Union’s Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (the “Directive”) came into effect, and each of the European Union’s members were obligated to implement the Directive by June 2021. To date, several EU Member States have implemented the Directive.

Directive Article 17 removes the shield of the current ‘hosting exemption,’ enshrined in the Electronic Commerce Directive (2000/31/EC) (the “E-Commerce Directive”), and replaces it with a principle of full liability where “online content sharing service providers” (“OCSSPs”) are concerned. This means that OCSSPs will be liable for copyright-protected material uploaded by users and must obtain authorization (i.e., a license) from the relevant rightsholders. However, Article 17 effectively creates a new liability exemption regime for OCSSPs (albeit a more onerous one than is currently provided by the E-Commerce Directive) under which OCSSPs will not be liable for the copyright-protected works that they communicate to the public provided that they cooperate with rightsholders by:

The article also extends any licenses granted to OCSSPs to their users, as long as those users are not acting “on a commercial basis.”

Additionally, our increased use of artificial intelligence (“AI”), including generative AI, in our product offerings presents additional risks. Namely, uncertain legal and regulatory treatment around the provision and use of such technologies, for example in the areas of privacy and intellectual property, may create increased and uncertain litigation exposure, the possibility of regulatory scrutiny, costly compliance requirements and limit or prohibit certain of our product offerings. Compliance with these laws and regulations may be onerous and expensive, and may be inconsistent from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, further increasing the cost of compliance and the risk of liability. Any such increase in costs or increased risk of liability as a result of changes in these laws and regulations or in their interpretation could individually or in the aggregate make our products and services that use AI technologies less attractive to our users, cause us to change or limit our business practices or affect our financial condition and operating results. Moreover, AI may produce content seen as infringing upon the rights of others, including with respect to copyrights. Additionally, AI may create flawed, biased, harmful, misleading, inaccurate, or unexpected outputs and content, creating risks to our business, partners, and users.

Although we have invested and continue to invest in systems and resources, which are intended to ensure that we are compliant with the requirements of the GDPR, CCPA, DMCA, the Directive and other U.S. and international laws relating to, among other things, materials that infringe on copyrights and contain other objectionable content, our systems may not be sufficient or we may unintentionally err and fail to comply with these laws and regulations which could expose us to claims, judgments, monetary liabilities and other remedies, and to limitations on our business practices which could materially adversely affect our business and financial results.

Data privacy and security laws and regulations in the jurisdictions in which we do business subject us to possible sanctions, civil lawsuits (including class action or similar representative lawsuits) and other penalties in the event of non-compliance, additionally the need to observe these regulations increases the cost of doing business and these laws and regulations are continually evolving. Compliance failure either by us or our partners, or vendors could harm our business.

Our business relies on collecting, processing, storing, using and sharing data, some of which contains personal information, including the personal information of our users. Our business is therefore subject to a number of federal, state, local and foreign laws, regulations, regulatory codes and guidelines governing data privacy, data protection and security, including with respect to the collection, storage, use, processing, transmission, sharing and protection of personal information. Such laws, regulations, regulatory codes and guidelines may be inconsistent across jurisdictions or conflict with other rules and change regularly.

On July 10, 2023, the European Commission adopted its adequacy decision relating to the new EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (“DPF”). This was followed by the UK Government’s approval of the UK extension to the DPF, which is effective as of October 12, 2023. The DPF and UK extension are now lawful means for transferring personal data from the European Economic Area (“EEA”), or the UK to the U.S. (in addition to Standard Contractual Clauses (“SCCs”)). The DPF (and the associated steps that the U.S. Government has taken in connection with the DPF) should improve the ability for personal data to flow from the EEA or UK to the U.S., however the DPF is likely to be subject to challenge and may be invalidated in the future. While this does not present an immediate risk to our business, monitoring and ensuring compliance with shifting data transfer requirements could result in additional costs incurred.

Following the Brexit, the provisions of the EU General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (“GDPR”) have been incorporated directly into UK law as the “UK GDPR”. In practice, there is little change to the core data protection principles, rights and obligations under UK data protection law. On June 28, 2021, the European Commission determined that the UK offers an adequate level of data protection, meaning data can continue to flow between the UK and EEA as it did prior to Brexit, in most circumstances. On March 8, 2023, the UK Parliament introduced the Data Protection and Digital Information (No. 2) Bill (“DPDI”) which is currently making its way through the UK legislative process. The DPDI proposes various amendments to the UK GDPR. Based on the DPDI’s current drafting, the amendments do not appear to present a material risk to our business as they are not considered to substantively alter the obligations placed on businesses. However, monitoring the DPDI’s progression through the UK legislative process and considering impacts it may have on our UK data protection compliance may result in additional costs. Further, to the extent that the DPDI is amended such that the changes it makes to the UK GDPR are more significant, this may present a greater risk.

In June 2018, California passed the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), effective January 1, 2020. The CCPA is a privacy law that provides consumers significant rights over the use of their personal information, including the right to object to the “sale” of their personal information. Amendments to the CCPA under the California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”), effective January 1, 2023, expand some of the CCPA rights to residents to restrict the use of certain information. These laws may restrict our ability to use personal information in connection with our business operations, and along with other state laws, such as the California Online Privacy Protection Act, create compliance obligations. The CCPA also provides a private right of action for certain data breaches.

Additionally, alongside California, several other states have also enacted comprehensive consumer data privacy laws. These laws include the Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act, effective January 1, 2023, the Colorado Privacy Act and the Connecticut Data Privacy Act both of which become effective on July 1, 2023, and the Utah Consumer Privacy Act which will become effective on December 31, 2023. Other states, including Oregon, Montana, Iowa, Texas, Delaware, Tennessee, and Indiana have enacted comprehensive consumer data privacy laws which will become effective in the coming years. Moreover, some U.S. states have enacted narrower consumer data privacy requirements. These laws generally place limitations on the use of consumer personal information and create data privacy and protection compliance obligations for businesses covered under the law (the jurisdictional requirements of which may vary).

Furthermore, all 50 U.S. states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories have enacted breach notification laws which require notification to individuals (and potentially regulators and other parties) in the event of certain data breaches impacting personal information.

Several states have enacted laws requiring businesses subject to the laws to implement cyber and data security programs. For example, New York enacted the Stop Hacks and Improve Electronic Data Security Act (SHIELD Act), effective March 2020, which requires companies with data relating to New Yorkers to adopt comprehensive cybersecurity programs. Since 2010, Massachusetts, through 201 CMR 17.00, has required companies that own or license the personal information of Massachusetts residents to develop, implement, and maintain a Written Information Security Program.  

In recent years, the U.S. and European lawmakers and regulators have voiced concern about electronic marketing and the use of third-party cookies and similar technology for online behavioral advertising. In the EU, marketing is defined broadly to include any promotional material and the rules specifically on e-marketing are currently set out in the ePrivacy Directive which is expected to be replaced by a new ePrivacy Regulation. While the ePrivacy Regulation was originally intended to be adopted in May of 2018 it is still making its way through the European legislative process and has faced repeated setbacks due to an inability by the EU bodies to reach an agreement on the ePrivacy Regulation’s text. The current draft of the ePrivacy Regulation imposes strict opt-in e-marketing rules with limited exceptions for business-to-business communications and significantly increases fining powers to the same levels as the GDPR. Regulation of cookies may result in broader restrictions on our online activities, including efforts to understand followers’ internet usage and promote ourselves to them.

In addition, Lithuania, Israel, and Norway, each have unique data privacy regulations that impact how and what we can do with employee data and require local compliance efforts.

Efforts to comply with these and other data privacy and security restrictions that may be adopted could require us to modify our data processing practices and policies, increasing the cost of our operations. Failure to comply could subject us to criminal and civil sanctions and other penalties. In part due to the uncertainty of the legal climate, complying with regulations, and any applicable rules or guidance from regulatory authorities or self-regulatory organizations relating to privacy, data protection, information security and consumer protection, may result in substantial costs and may require changes to our business practices, which may limit our growth strategy, adversely impact our ability to attract or retain players, and otherwise negatively affect our business, reputation, legal exposure, financial condition and results of operations.

Any failure or perceived compliance failure with our posted privacy policies, our privacy-related obligations to users or other third parties, or any other legal obligations or regulatory requirements relating to privacy, data protection, or information security may result in official investigations or enforcement actions, litigation, legal claims, or negative publicity from consumer advocacy groups or the press and could result in significant liability, cause our users to lose trust in us to the point of severing their relationship with us, and otherwise materially and adversely affect our business. Furthermore, the costs of compliance with, and other burdens imposed by, the laws, regulations, and policies that are applicable to us may limit the adoption and use of, and reduce the overall demand for, our products and services. Additionally, service providers or other third parties that we work with, violate applicable laws, regulations, or agreements, such violations may put our users’ and/or employees’ data at risk, could result in formal investigations or enforcement actions, fines, litigation, claims or negative publicity from consumer advocacy groups or the press and could result in significant liability, cause our players to lose trust in us and otherwise materially and adversely affect our reputation and business. Further, public scrutiny of data practices and privacy, or complaints about, such practices, especially when lodged against technology companies, may heighten the chances for an official investigation and result in modifications to existing or the introduction of new regulatory requirements resulting in higher costs and risks.

New laws that may impact our business, such as those affecting artificial intelligence and efforts by lawmakers in various jurisdictions to regulate providers of certain online services which may apply to our business and therefore introduce additional compliance obligations and potential sanctions and penalties for failings in these areas. Monitoring (and, if applicable, complying with) these developments is likely to increase the cost of doing business and any failure to comply with new laws may harm our business and reputation.

On October 19, 2022, the EU passed Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 on a Single Market for Digital Services (Digital Services Act) (“DSA”). The DSA largely comes into effect on February 17, 2024, and seeks to increase the regulatory obligations on “intermediary service providers.”

Similarly, the UK Parliament recently approved the Online Services Bill (“OSB”) which is now awaiting royal assent before becoming law (this is expected to occur in late 2023 or early 2024 with a transition period before the obligations are enforceable). The OSB regulates “user-to-user” services, e.g., services that allow content to be generated by a user and then shared and encountered by other users. The DSA and OSB impose additional obligations on covered service providers and may increase liability for such service providers in relation to content hosted and shared on their services. Our business allows users to create accounts and upload content which can then be accessed/encountered by other users. As such, we will likely incur legal costs in identifying the extent to which obligations under the DSA and OSB may impact our business and there may be ongoing compliance costs associated with these new laws (and any comparable changes in the law in other jurisdictions). Any breaches of these new laws (to the extent they apply) may also lead to penalties and reputational damage.

Furthermore, legislators’ and regulators’ future approach to artificial intelligence (“AI”) may impact our business. For example, the publication of the White House Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights signals that operators of AI systems in the U.S. may face significant compliance obligations of a go-forward basis. Similarly, if enacted into law, the European Commission’s Artificial Intelligence Regulation (“AI Regulation”) would impose compliance obligations on operators of AI systems and introduce regulatory fines for breaches of such obligations. We currently offer a number of products, services and features that make use of AI, and we are exploring ways in which we can further utilize the technology. The full extent and applicability of potential AI laws and regulations will require monitoring to ensure we remain in compliance and any risks are appropriately mitigated.

RISKS RELATED TO CONTENT AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

If we are unable to license, acquire or otherwise obtain access to compelling content and services at reasonable cost or if we do not develop or commission compelling content of our own, the number of users of the Zedge Marketplace may not grow as anticipated, or may decline, or users’ level of engagement with the Zedge Marketplace may decline, all or any of which could materially harm our business and operating results.

Our future success depends, in part, on our ability to aggregate and host compelling content and deliver that content to our users via our digital properties. We achieve this when users play our games, when artists, individual creators and brands upload their licensed content to our marketplace, or when we create content or enter into business partnerships with content owners and distribute this content in our marketplace. In addition, we commission authors to write articles for our blog.

We believe that users value high-quality content. As such, we may need to make substantial payments to third parties from whom we license or acquire such content from or from whom we create this content for our behalf. Our ability to maintain and build relationships with such third-party providers may become important to our success. As competition for compelling content increases both domestically and internationally, our partners may alter business terms under which they avail their content and services to us and potential providers may not offer their content or services to us at all, or may offer them on terms that are not agreeable to us. A change in these commercial terms could harm our operating results and financial condition. Further, much of the content that we acquire may only be available on a non-exclusive basis allowing competitors the ability of offering this content to our disadvantage.

We may be subject to intellectual property infringement claims or other allegations, which could require us to pay substantial statutory penalties or other damages and fines, remove relevant content, enter into license agreements which may not be available on commercially reasonable terms or could result in our being barred from third-party distribution platforms, which could harm our business and competitive position.

There may be owners of technology patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets and content, who assert claims against us. There may also be laws and regulations that are adopted that change the rules related to the safe harbor for user generated content and ultimately requiring us to pay licensing fees. If a claim of infringement is brought against us, we may be required to pay substantial penalties or other damages and fines, remove relevant content, enter into license agreements that may not be available on commercially reasonable terms or at all or be barred from any of the third-party distribution platforms. Even though the allegations or claims could be baseless, our defense against any of these allegations or claims would be both costly and time-consuming and could significantly divert the efforts and resources of our management and other personnel.

We may not be able to prevent others from unauthorized use of our intellectual property, which could materially harm our business and competitive position.

We regard our trademarks, service marks, patents, domain names, trade secrets, proprietary technologies and similar intellectual property as critical to our success, and we rely on trademark and patent law, trade secret protection and confidentiality and license agreements with our employees and others to protect our proprietary right. As of July 31, 2023, we have registered, amongst others, the following domain names: www.zedge.net, www.zedge.com, www.emojipedia.com, www.emojipedia.org, and gurushots.com. In addition, we have been granted trademark protection for “Zedge” in the United States, European Union, United Kingdom, India, and Canada, “We Make Phones Personal,” “Zedge, Everything You,” “Tattoo Your Phone,” “Shortz – Chat Stories by Zedge,” and “NFTs Made Easy” in the United States, a stylized “D” logo in the European Union, the United Kingdom, and United States, “Emojipedia” in the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, China and Australia, “World Emoji Day” in the United States and United Kingdom, and “GuruShots” in the United States. We have also applied for trademark protection for “AI Art Battles (& Design)”, “pAInt,” and “Zedge pAInt” in the United States, a stylized “D” logo in Canada and India, and “GuruShots” in Canada, India, the European Union, and the United Kingdom, and have obtained copyright registrations for the GuruShots mobile and web-based applications, and have obtained a copyright registration for our flagship app, Zedge. 

Monitoring unauthorized use of our intellectual property rights is difficult and costly, and we cannot be certain that we can effectively prevent misappropriation of our intellectual property, particularly in countries where the laws may not protect our proprietary rights as fully as in the United States. From time to time, we may have to resort to litigation to enforce our intellectual property rights, which could result in substantial costs and diversion of our resources and may not be successful.

In addition, it is often difficult to create and enforce intellectual property rights in certain international markets. Patents, trademarks and service marks may also be invalidated, circumvented, or challenged. Trade secrets are difficult to protect, and our trade secrets may be leaked or otherwise become known or be independently discovered by others. Confidentiality agreements may be breached, and we may not have adequate remedies for any breach. Even where adequate and relevant laws exist it may not be possible to obtain swift and equitable enforcement of such laws, or to obtain enforcement of a court judgment or an arbitration award delivered in another jurisdiction, and accordingly, we may not be able to effectively protect our intellectual property rights or enforce agreements in such countries.

Our insurance may not provide adequate levels of coverage against claims.

We believe that we maintain insurance customary for businesses of our size and type. However, there are types of losses we may incur that cannot be insured against or that we believe are not economically reasonable or practical to insure. In addition, any loss incurred could exceed policy limits and policy payments made to us may not be made on a timely basis. Such losses could adversely affect our business prospects, results of operations, cash flows and financial condition.

RISKS RELATED INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND DATA SECURITY

Our business depends on our ability to collect and effectively use data to serve relevant advertising, deliver suitable content, and identify appropriate customer prospects, and any limitation on the collection and use of this data could significantly diminish the value of our services, cause us to lose clients, make us less attractive to prospective customers and revenues.

When one uses our products and services, we may collect both personally identifiable and non-personally identifiable data about the user. This may include but is not limited to the user’s name, telephone number, email address, web cookies, Meta and other login credentials, phone model, operating system, location, Android Advertising ID (“AAID”), Apple’s Identifier for Advertising, IDFA, as well as information relating to their interaction with advertisements and content appearing within our products. Often, we use some of this data to provide a better experience for the user by delivering both relevant content and advertisements. In addition, we use some of this data to help us target prospective customers as well as for advertising reporting purposes.

Additionally, internet enabled devices and operating systems are controlled by third parties and in most cases offer options that allow users to disable functionality that allows for the delivery of advertising on their devices. Device and browser manufacturers may include or expand these features as part of their standard device specifications. For example, Apple deprecated UDID, a standard device identifier, ultimately replacing it with IDFA, which makes the process for iPhone users to opt out of behavioral targeting easier. If players elect to opt-out of sharing data about themselves we will be curtailed in our ability to deliver effective which could negatively affect our digital advertising revenues.

Although our Privacy Policy and Terms of Service provide extensive details about how we use customer data our clients may decide not to allow us to collect some or all of this data or may limit how we can use this data. Any limitation on our ability to collect data about user behavior and app interactions would likely make it more difficult for us to deliver germane content to our users and effective mobile advertising campaigns that meet the demands of our advertisers.

Our contracts with advertisers generally permit us to aggregate data from advertising campaigns, yet these clients might nonetheless request that we discontinue using data obtained from their campaigns that have already been aggregated with other clients’ campaign data. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to comply with these requests, and these kinds of requests could also cause us to invest significant amounts of resources. Interruptions, failures or defects in our data collection, mining, analysis and storage systems, as well as privacy concerns and regulatory restrictions regarding the collection of data, could also limit our ability to aggregate and analyze mobile device user data from our clients’ advertising campaigns. If that happens, we may not be able to optimize the placement of advertising for the benefit of our advertiser clients, which could make our services less valuable, and, as a result, we may lose clients and our revenues may materially decline.

Security breaches or computer virus attacks could have a material adverse effect on our business prospects and results of operations.

Any significant breach of security of our computer systems could significantly harm our business, reputation and results of operations and could expose us to lawsuits brought by our users and partners and to sanctions by governmental authorities in the jurisdictions in which we operate. We cannot assure you that our IT systems or those of third-parties that we depend on will be secure from future security breaches or computer virus attacks. Anyone who is able to circumvent our security measures could misappropriate proprietary information, including the personal information of our users, obtaining users’ names and passwords and enabling the hackers to access user’s other online and mobile accounts, if those users use identical usernames and passwords. They could also misappropriate other information, including our content. These circumventions may cause interruptions in our operations or damage our brand image and reputation. Our servers may be vulnerable to computer viruses, physical or electronic break-ins and similar disruptions, which could cause system interruptions, website slowdown or unavailability, delays in communication or transactions, or loss of data. We may be required to incur significant additional costs to protect against security breaches or to alleviate problems caused by such breaches. In addition, a significant security breach or virus attack on our system could result in a material adverse impact on our business and results of operations.

The investment needed to eliminate or address security threats and vulnerabilities before or after a cyber-incident could be material. Our remediation efforts may not be successful and could result in interruptions, delays or cessation of service, and loss of existing or potential suppliers, users, or creators. As threats related to cyber-attacks continuously evolve and grow, we may also find it necessary to invest additional resources in protecting our data and infrastructure, which may impact our results of operations. Although we have insurance coverage protection against cyber-attacks, it may not be sufficient to cover all possible claims stemming from security breaches, cyberattacks and other types of unlawful activity, or any resulting disruptions from such events, and we may suffer losses that could have a material adverse effect on our business. We could also be negatively impacted by existing and proposed laws and regulations in the United States, Lithuania, Israel, Norway the European Union, and other jurisdictions, as well as government policies and practices related to cybersecurity, data privacy, data localization and data protection.

In addition, the platforms that we use to distribute our apps may encourage, or require, compliance with certain security standards, such as the voluntary cybersecurity framework released by the National Institute of Standards and Technology which consists of controls designed to identify and manage cyber-security risks, and we could be negatively impacted to the extent we are unable to comply with such standards.

RISKS RELATED TO OUR OWNERSHIP AND OUR CLASS B COMMON STOCK

We have granted, and may continue to grant, options, restricted shares and other types of awards under our stock option and equity incentive plans and otherwise, which may result in increased equity-based compensation expenses.

The expenses associated with equity-based compensation have affected our net income and may reduce our net income in the future, and any additional equity issued under equity-based compensation schemes will dilute the ownership interests of our stockholders. We believe the granting of equity-based compensation is of significant importance to our ability to attract and retain key personnel and employees, consultants and directors, and we will continue to grant equity-based compensation in the future. As a result, our expenses associated with equity-based compensation may increase, which may have an adverse effect on our results of operations and would dilute the ownership interests of our stockholders.

Investors may suffer dilution.

We may engage in equity financing to fund our future operations and growth or acquisitions. If we raise additional funds and/or provide consideration in acquisitions by issuing equity securities, stockholders may experience significant dilution of their ownership interest (both with respect to the percentage of total securities held, and with respect to the book value of their securities) and such securities may have rights senior to those of the holders of our Class B common stock.

For example, between December 14, 2020 and January 26, 2021, we sold 761,906 shares of our Class B common stock at an average price of $6.5625 per share for total proceeds of $5 million in a registered “At-the-Market” offering through National Securities Corp. and H.C. Wainwright & Co, LLC as sales agents. We intend to use the net proceeds from this offering for general corporate purposes including organic and other growth initiatives.

In addition, on March 16, 2021, we filed a prospectus supplement with the Securities and Exchange Commission which contemplates the sale, for a gross aggregate sale price of up to $10,000,000, of shares of our Class B common stock, from time to time in “At-The-Market” offerings pursuant to an At Market Issuance Sales Agreement with National Securities Corporation and Maxim Group LLC dated as of March 16, 2021. Through June 11, 2021, we sold 663,686 shares at an average price of $15.0674 per share for total proceeds of $10 million in this offering. We intend to use the net proceeds from this offering for general corporate purposes including organic and other growth initiatives.

A portion of the purchase price for GuruShots may be paid, at the Company’s discretion in Class B common stock and, in connection with the acquisition, the Company committed to issuing 626,242 shares of the Company Class B common stock to serve as a retention pool for GuruShots employees.

Any such equity financing could occur at prices below, or well below, the then-current trading price of our Class B common stock, which would further exacerbate the ownership interests of our stockholders.

Our business, financial condition and results of operations, as well as our ability to obtain additional financing, may be adversely affected by downturn in the global economy.

The global financial markets have experienced significant disruptions over the past fifteen years and the recoveries from the lows of 2008 and 2009 as well as from the Covid 19 pandemic have been uneven. There is considerable uncertainty over the long-term effects of the expansionary monetary and fiscal policies adopted by the central banks and financial authorities of some of the world’s leading economies. There have also been concerns over unrest in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa, which have resulted in volatility in the energy and food sectors amongst other markets. We may be affected by economic downturns. A prolonged slowdown in the world economy may lead to a reduced amount of mobile internet advertising, which could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Moreover, a slowdown or disruption in the global economy may have a material and adverse impact on financings available to us. The weakness in the economy could erode investor confidence, which constitutes the basis of the credit market. Turmoil affecting the financial markets and banking system may significantly restrict our ability to obtain financing in the capital markets or from financial institutions on commercially reasonable terms, or at all.

The trading price of the shares of our Class B common stock may be volatile, and purchasers of our Class B common stock could incur substantial losses.

Our stock price could be volatile. The stock market in general and the market for mobile internet companies in particular have experienced extreme volatility that has often been unrelated to the operating performance of particular companies. As a result of this volatility, investors may not be able to sell their Class B common stock at or above the price paid for the shares. The market price for our Class B common stock may be influenced by many factors, including:

In addition, in the past, stockholders have initiated class action lawsuits against technology companies following periods of volatility in the market prices of these companies’ stock. Such litigation, if instituted against us, could cause us to incur substantial costs and divert management’s attention and resources.

We are controlled by our majority stockholder, which limits the ability of other stockholders to affect our management.

Michael Jonas is our majority stockholder, Executive Chairman, Chairman of the Board and a director, and, as of October 30, 2023, had voting power over 1,918,159 shares of our Class B common stock (which includes 524,775 shares of our Class A common stock, which are convertible into shares of our Class B common stock on a 1-for-1 basis, and 1,393,384 shares of our Class B common stock), representing approximately 57.9% of the combined voting power of our outstanding capital stock. Mr. Jonas is able to control matters requiring approval by our stockholders, including the election of all of the directors and the approval of significant corporate matters, including any merger, consolidation or sale of all or substantially all of our assets. As a result, the ability of any of our other stockholders to influence our management is limited. 

If securities or industry analysts do not publish research or publish unfavorable research about our business or our stock, our stock price and trading volume could decline.

The trading market for our common Class B common stock relies in part on the research and reports that equity research analysts publish about us and our business. Currently, only one investment bank, Maxim Group LLC, publishes equity research about Zedge and there are no guarantees that they will continue providing coverage in the future. We may never obtain research coverage by other equity research analysts. Equity research analysts may elect not to provide research coverage of our Class B common stock, and such lack of research coverage may adversely affect the market price of our Class B common stock. We do not have any control over the equity research analysts or their content and opinions included in their reports. The price of our stock could decline if one or more equity research analysts downgrade our stock or issues other unfavorable commentary or research. If one or more equity research analysts ceases coverage of our company or fails to publish reports on us regularly, demand for our stock could decrease, which in turn could cause our stock price and/or trading volume to decline.

Our results of operations may be subject to wide fluctuations due to a number of factors, which may adversely affect the trading price of our Class B common stock.

We may experience seasonality and other fluctuations in our business, reflecting fluctuations in internet and smartphone usage and advertising. Revenues from consumer internet and mobile application products and services are typically higher in the fourth quarter of the calendar year due to increased year-end advertising and marketing budgets. Conversely, we generally experience lower advertising revenues during the first quarter of the calendar year due to weaker advertising spend following the holidays. Thus, our operating results in one or more future quarters or years may fluctuate substantially or fall below the expectations of securities analysts and investors. In such an event, the trading price of our Class B common stock may fluctuate significantly or decrease significantly.

Item 1B. Unresolved Staff Comments.

None.

Item 2. Properties

Our principal executive office was located in a leased premises comprising approximately 500 square feet of space in New York City, which lease was terminated on July 15, 2020. Since July 2020, we have maintained a virtual presence as our headquarters as our corporate staff has been working remotely. Effective April 1, 2021, the Company relocated its main office in Trondheim, Norway with 11,600 square feet of office space to a 4,900 square-foot facility. GuruShots leases 1,600 square feet of office space in Tel Aviv, Israel. We also lease a satellite development center in Vilnius, Lithuania. Our servers are hosted in leased data centers in different geographic locations in the United States. These data centers are owned and maintained by third-party data center providers. The Company believes it has sufficient space to accommodate its employees and operations.

Item 3. Legal Proceedings

We may from time to time be subject to legal proceedings that arise in the ordinary course of business. Although there can be no assurance in this regard, we do not expect any of those legal proceedings to have a material adverse effect on our results of operations, cash flows or financial condition.

Item 4. Mine Safety Disclosures

None.

PART II

Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities

Class B Common Stock

Our Class B common stock is quoted on the NYSE American stock exchange under the trading symbol ZDGE. Trading commenced on the NYSE American on June 1, 2016. On October 26, 2023, the last sales price reported on the NYSE American for our Class B common stock was $1.95 per share.

On October 26, 2023, there were 271 holders of record of our Class B common stock and 1 holder of record of our Class A common stock. As of October 26, 2023, all shares of Class A common stock are beneficially owned by Michael Jonas. The number of holders of record of our Class B common stock does not include the number of persons whose shares are in nominee or in “street name” accounts through brokers.

We do not anticipate paying dividends on our common stock until we achieve sustainable profitability (after satisfying all of our operational needs) and retain certain minimum cash reserves. Distributions will be subject to the need to retain earnings for investment in growth opportunities or the acquisition of complementary assets. The payment of dividends in any specific period will be at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

The information required by Item 201(d) of Regulation S-K will be contained in our Proxy Statement for our Annual Stockholders Meeting, which we will file with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 120 days after July 31, 2023, and which is incorporated by reference herein.

Recent Sales of Unregistered Securities

None.

Performance Graph of Stock

We are a smaller reporting company as defined by Rule 12b-2 of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934 and are not required to provide the information under this item.

Issuer Repurchases of Equity Securities

In October 2021, our board of directors authorized a repurchase program of up to 1.5 million shares of our Class B common stock at a maximum aggregate purchase price of $3.0 million. Repurchases may be made from time to time through open market purchases or through privately negotiated transactions, subject to market conditions, applicable legal requirements and other relevant factors. Open market repurchases may be structured to occur in accordance with the requirements of Rule 10b-18. We may also, from time to time, enter into Rule 10b-5 trading plans to facilitate repurchases of its shares. The repurchase program does not obligate us to acquire any particular amount of our Class A common stock, has no expiration date and may be modified, suspended, or terminated at any time at our discretion.

The following table summarizes the share repurchase activity for the fourth quarter fiscal of 2023:

Item 6. [Reserved].

Not applicable.

Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.

This Annual Report contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, including statements that contain the words “believes,” “anticipates,” “expects,” “plans,” “intends” and similar words and phrases. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results projected in any forward-looking statement. In addition to the factors specifically noted in the forward-looking statements, other important factors, risks and uncertainties that could result in those differences include, but are not limited to, those discussed under Item 1A to Part I “Risk Factors” in this Annual Report. The forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this Annual Report, and we assume no obligation to update the forward-looking statements, or to update the reasons why actual results could differ from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Investors should consult all of the information set forth in this report and the other information set forth from time to time in our reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission pursuant to the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, including our reports on Forms 10-Q and 8-K.

The following discussion should be read in conjunction with the Consolidated Financial Statements and Notes thereto included in Item 8 of this Annual Report.

Overview

Zedge, Inc. (“Zedge”) builds digital marketplaces and friendly competitive games around content that people use to express themselves. Our leading products include Zedge Ringtones and Wallpapers, a freemium digital content marketplace offering mobile phone wallpapers, video wallpapers, ringtones, and notification sounds as well as pAInt, a generative AI wallpaper maker, GuruShots, a skill-based photo challenge game, and Emojipedia, the #1 trusted source for ‘all things emoji’. Our vision is to enable and connect creators who enjoy friendly competitions with a community of prospective consumers in order to drive commerce.

We are part of the ‘Creator Economy,’ where over 1 billion people create and share their content across social platforms, mobile, and video games, and content marketplaces. According to Linktree, over 200 million identify as creators, people who use their influence, skill, and creativity to amass an audience and monetize it. Furthermore, TechCrunch reports that 12% of full-time creators earn more than $50,000 per year, while Influencer Hub reports 10% of influencers earn more than $100,000 per year. We view the Creator Economy as an opportunity for Zedge to expand its business, especially as we execute by connecting our gamers with our marketplace.

The Zedge Ringtones and Wallpapers app (which is named “Zedge Wallpapers” in the App Store), which we refer to as our “Zedge App,” offers a wide array of mobile personalization content including wallpapers, video wallpapers, ringtones, and notification sounds, and is available both in Google Play and the App Store. As of July 31, 2023, our Zedge App has been installed nearly 621 million times since inception and, over the past two fiscal years, has had between 30.8 and 36.3 million monthly active users (“MAU”), ending with 30.9 million MAU as of July 31, 2023. MAU is a key performance indicator (“KPI”) that captures the number of unique users that used our Zedge App during the final 30 days of the relevant period. Our platform allows creators to upload content to our marketplace and avail it to our users either for free or for a price, via ‘Zedge Premium,’ the section of our marketplace where we offer premium content (i.e., for purchase). In turn, our users utilize the content to personalize their phones and express their individuality.

In fiscal 2023, we introduced pAInt, a generative AI wallpaper maker in the Zedge App. A generative AI wallpaper maker is an implementation of artificial intelligence software that can create images from text descriptions. To interface with a generative AI image maker, a user enters a text description of the image they want to create, and the software generates an image based on that description. In addition, we upgraded Zedge+, our paid subscription offering, by bundling together an ad-free experience with value adds making the offering more compelling.

In fiscal 2022, we introduced several new customer facing product features and social and community features, all meant to improve customer engagement, MAU, and revenue growth over the long term.

The Zedge Marketplace monetization stack consists of advertising revenue generated when users view advertisements when using the Zedge App (and the related functionality under the Zedge.net website), the in-app (or web-based) sale of Zedge Credits, our virtual currency, that is used to purchase Zedge Premium content, and a paid-subscription offering that provides an ad-free experience to users that purchase a monthly or annual subscription. In April 2023, we introduced a subscription tier in the iOS version of the app. As of July 31, 2023, we had approximately 638,000 active paying subscribers.

In late 2021, we introduced ‘NFTs Made Easy’ to a limited number of Zedge Premium creators. All NFT Made Easy transactions are made using Zedge Credits.

We often refer to our freemium ringtones and wallpapers, our subscription offering, the functionality for creators to market their products and ancillary offering and features both in our Zedge App and website, as our Zedge Marketplace. 

In April 2022, we acquired GuruShots, a recognized category leader focused on gamifying the photography vertical. GuruShots offers a platform spanning iOS, Android, and the web that provides a fun, educational and structured way for amateur photographers to compete in a wide variety of contests showcasing their photos while gaining recognition with votes, badges, and awards. We estimate that the total addressable market of amateur photographers using their smartphones to take and publicly share artistic photos is 30-40 million people per month and that the market is still in its infancy. Every month, GuruShots stages more than 300 competitions that result in players uploading in excess of 750,000 photographs and casting close to 4 billion “perceived votes”, which are calculated by multiplying the number of votes that each player casts by a weighting factor based on various factors related to that user. To improve engagement, GuruShots has adopted a set of retention dynamics focused on individual, team and community dynamics that create a sense of belonging, inspiration, recognition, improvement, and competition.

Today, GuruShots utilizes a ‘Free-to-Play’ business model that leads to strong monetization with the purchase of resources that are used to give paying players an edge while still maintaining a fair and competitive experience for all participants. Over the past seven years, the monthly average paying player spend has increased in excess of 11.6% annually to more than $51.3 per player.

As we look to the future, we are advancing several initiatives that we expect will drive user growth, increase engagement, drive in-app purchases, and advance our in-game economy. Some of these include:

We market GuruShots to prospective players, primarily via paid user acquisition channels, and utilize a host of creative formats including static and video ads in order to promote the game. Our marketing team invests material resources in analyzing all attributes of a campaign ranging from the creative assets, offer acquisition channel, and platform (i.e., iOS, Android, and web), just to name a few, with the goal of determining whether a specific campaign is likely to yield a profitable customer. When we unearth a successful combination of these variables we scale up until we experience diminishing returns. Ultimately, we believe that the efforts we are making to advance the product coupled with the investment in user acquisition can significantly increase GuruShots’ player base.

Beyond our commitment to growing both the Zedge App and GuruShots on a standalone basis, we believe that there are many potential synergies that we can capitalize on that exist between the two businesses. Specifically, we plan to enable the ability for GuruShots players to become Zedge Premium artists and sell their photos to our audience of 30+ million MAU as standard digital images or NFTs. In addition, we look to benefit from the experience that the GuruShots team possesses and test gamifying the Zedge App. We believe that successful gamification can contribute to increasing engagement, retention, and lifetime value, all critical KPIs for our business. Longer term, we believe that there are complementary content verticals that lend themselves to gamification. To this end we have been developing a new hybrid casual title, ‘AI Art Master,’ which enables players to create generative AI images and compete in themed based competitions with these images. AI Art Master is currently in soft-launch in the Philippines, Poland, and India with the goal of commercial launch in late 2023 or early 2024.

In August 2021, we acquired the assets of Emojipedia Pty Ltd (“Emojipedia”), including Emojipedia.org the world’s leading authority dedicated to providing up-to-date and well-researched emoji definitions, information, and news as well as World Emoji Day and the annual World Emoji Awards. In July 2023, Emojipedia received approximately 45 million monthly page views and has approximately 9.7 million monthly active users as of July 31, 2023 of which approximately 50.3% are located in well-developed markets. It is the top resource for all things emoji, offering insights into data and cultural trends. As a member of the Unicode Consortium, the standards body responsible for approving new emojis, Emojipedia works alongside major emoji creators including Apple, Google, Meta, and X, formally known as Twitter.

We believe that Emojipedia provides growth potential to the Zedge App, and it was immediately accretive to earnings. In the past year, we have made many changes to Emojipedia including migrating to a new ad mediation platform, overhauling its backend, and redesigning the Emojipedia website. We will continue to enhance this offering and are exploring new features including a native mobile offering as well as additional monetization opportunities.

Reportable Segments

Our business consists of two reportable segments.

CRITICAL ACCOUNTING POLICIES 

Our consolidated financial statements and accompanying notes are prepared in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America, or U.S. GAAP. The preparation of financial statements requires management to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets, liabilities, revenue and expenses as well as the disclosure of contingent assets and liabilities. Critical accounting policies are those that require application of management’s most subjective or complex judgments, often as a result of matters that are inherently uncertain and may change in subsequent periods. Our critical accounting policies include those related to revenue recognition, business combination, intangible and goodwill, capitalized software and technology development costs and stock-based compensation. Management bases its estimates and judgments on historical experience and other factors that are believed to be reasonable under the circumstances. Actual results may differ from these estimates under different assumptions or conditions. See Note 1, Description of Business and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K for a complete discussion of our significant accounting policies.

Revenue Recognition

We generate revenue from the following sources: (1) Advertising; (2) Paid Subscription; (3) Other revenues including primarily Zedge Premium, the section of our marketplace where we offer premium content (i.e., for purchase), and (4) Digital Goods and Services (from the GuruShots acquisition). The substantial majority of our revenue is generated from selling our advertising inventory (“Advertising Revenue”) to advertising networks, advertising exchanges, and direct arrangements with advertisers. Our monthly and yearly subscriptions allow users to prepay a fixed fee to remove unsolicited advertisements from the Android Zedge App in January 2019 and the iOS Zedge App users that began in April 2023. In Zedge Premium, we receive 30% as a fee when users purchase licensed content using Zedge Credits or unlock licensed content by watching a video or taking a survey on Zedge Premium. Sales and other similar taxes are excluded from revenues.

Advertising Revenue: We generate the bulk of our revenue from selling the Zedge Marketplace’s advertising inventory to advertising networks and advertising exchanges and direct sales to advertisers.

We recognize advertising revenue as advertisements are delivered to users through impressions or ad views (depending on the terms agreed upon with the advertiser). For in-app display ads, in-app offers, engagement advertisements and other advertisements, our performance obligations are satisfied over the life of the relevant contract (i.e., over time), with revenue being recognized as advertising units are delivered, which is Zedge’s performance obligation. The advertiser may compensate us on a cost-per-impression, cost-per-click, cost-per-action basis.

Paid Subscription Revenue: Beginning in January 2019 and April 2023, we started offering monthly and yearly paid subscription services sold through Google Play and the App Store, respectively. When a customer subscribes, they execute a clickthrough agreement with Zedge outlining the terms and conditions between Zedge and the subscriber. Google Play and the App Store process subscription prepayment on Zedge’s behalf, and retain up to 30% as a fee. Both monthly and yearly subscriptions are nonrefundable after a period of seven days. Paid subscriptions are automatically renewed at expiration unless cancelled by subscribers. While the customer can cancel at any time, he or she will not receive any refund but will remain entitled to receive the ad free service until the end of the subscription period. revenue for these contracts is recognized on a daily ratable basis. The payment terms for subscriptions sold through Google Play is net 30 days after month-end. The payment terms for subscriptions sold through the App Store is net 45 days after month-end. 

Zedge Premium: Zedge Premium is our marketplace where artists and brands can market, distribute and sell their digital content to Zedge’s users. The content owner sets the price and the end user can purchase the content by paying for it with Zedge Credits, our closed virtual currency. A user can earn Zedge Credits when taking specific actions such as watching rewarded videos or completing electronic surveys. Alternatively, users can buy Zedge Credits with an in-app purchase. If a user purchases Zedge Credits (ranging from 500 credits for $0.99 to 700,000 credits for $999.99), Google Play or App Store retains 30% of the purchase price as its fee. When a user purchases Zedge Premium content using Zedge credits, the artist or brand receives 70% of the actual revenue after the Google Play or iTunes fee (“Royalty Payment”) and we receive the remaining 30%, which is recognized as revenue.

Digital Goods and Services: GuruShots generates substantially all of its revenues by selling virtual goods (ex. power-ups, in-game resources) to its users. GuruShots distributes its game to end customers through mobile platforms such as Apple’s App Store and Google Play as well as via the web. Through these platforms, users can download the free-to-play game and can purchase virtual goods which are redeemed in the game to enhance their game-playing experience.

Players can pay for their virtual item purchases through various widely accepted payment methods offered in the game. Payments from players for virtual goods are required at the time of purchase, are non-cancellable and relate to non-cancellable contracts that specify GuruShots’ obligations and cannot be redeemed for cash nor exchanged for anything other than virtual goods within the GuruShots’ game. The purchase price is a fixed amount which reflects the consideration that GuruShots expects to be entitled to receive in exchange for use of virtual goods by its customers. The platform providers collect proceeds from the game players and remit the proceeds to GuruShots after deducting their respective platform fees. Sales and other taxes collected from customers on behalf of governmental authorities are accounted for on a net basis and are not included in revenues or operating expenses. GuruShots’ performance obligation is to display the virtual goods in game play based upon the nature of the virtual item.

GuruShots categorizes its virtual goods as consumable. GuruShots’ game sells only consumable virtual goods. Consumable virtual goods represent items that can be consumed by a specific player action and do not provide the player any continuing benefit following consumption. GuruShots has determined through a review of game play behavior that players generally do not purchase additional virtual goods until their existing virtual goods balances have been substantially consumed. This review includes an analysis of game players’ historical play behavior, purchase behavior, and the amounts of virtual goods outstanding. Revenue is recognized once the virtual goods are sold. GuruShots monitors its analysis of customer play behavior on a quarterly basis.

As discussed above, GuruShots concluded that revenue related to the promise of enhancing users’ gaming experience through in-game resources purchases should be recognized ratably over the period of benefit period (i.e., the period over which the enhanced gaming experience is provided). However, for practical reasons, GuruShots does not defer the portion of revenue attributable to future uses of Resources as of any given balance sheet date. This is due to the duration of the enhanced gaming experience that is provided being, in substantially all of the cases, and applying the portfolio approach (as GuruShots reasonably expects that the effects on the financial statements of applying ASC 606 guidance to the portfolio would not differ materially from applying ASC 606 guidance to the individual contracts), a very short time frame ranging from a few hours to less than two weeks. Therefore, the result of recognizing the related revenues at the point in time which user first consumes the respective Resource would yield a result that is not substantially different then ratable recognition over the period of benefit. Accordingly, revenue is recognized once the virtual goods are sold.

Gross Versus Net Revenue Recognition

We report revenue on a gross or net basis based on management’s assessment of whether we act as a principal or agent in the transaction. To the extent we act as the principal, revenue is reported on a gross basis. To the extent we act as the agent, revenue is reported on a net basis. The determination of whether we act as a principal or an agent in a transaction is based on an evaluation of whether we control the good or service prior to transfer to the customer.

We generally report our advertising revenue net of amounts due to agencies and brokers because we are not the primary obligor in the relevant arrangements, we do not finalize the pricing, and we do not establish or maintain a direct relationship with the advertiser. Certain advertising arrangements that are directly between us and advertisers are recognized on a gross basis equal to the price paid to us by the customer since we are the primary obligor and we determine the price. Any third-party costs related to such direct relationships are recognized as direct cost of revenues.

GuruShots is primarily responsible for providing the virtual goods, has control over the content and functionality of games and has the discretion to establish the virtual goods’ prices. Therefore, GuruShots is the principal and, accordingly revenues are recorded on a gross basis. Payment processing fees paid to platform providers are recorded within selling, general and administrative expenses.

We report subscription revenue gross of the fee retained by Google Play and the App Store, as the subscriber is our customer in the contract and we control the service prior to the transfer to the subscriber.

With respect to Zedge Premium, Zedge, as provider of the platform, is effectively operating as a broker or intermediary connecting online content providers with the end user. While we use gross revenue (net of the 30% fee retained by Google Play or AppStore when a user purchases Zedge Credits) as a performance metric, we record net revenue from Zedge Premium which consists of a 30% platform fee, in-app purchases profit and breakage. Content providers are paid their portion of revenue which is a 70% share of the gross revenue calculated.

Business Combinations and Contingent Considerations

We account for business combinations using the acquisition method of accounting. We allocate the purchase price of an acquisition to the tangible and intangible assets acquired and liabilities assumed and contingent considerations based on their estimated fair values at the relevant acquisition date. The excess of the purchase price over those fair values is recorded as goodwill. During the measurement period, which may be up to one year from the acquisition date, we may record adjustments to the assets acquired and liabilities assumed with a corresponding offset to goodwill. Upon the conclusion of the measurement period or final determination of the values of assets acquired or liabilities assumed, whichever comes first, any subsequent adjustments are recorded to the consolidated statements of (loss) income and comprehensive (loss) income. Acquisition-related costs are recognized separately from the acquisition and are expensed as incurred. The fair value of contingent consideration includes estimates and judgments made by management regarding the probability that future contingent payments will be made.

For contingent consideration, we update these estimates and the related fair value of contingent consideration using a Monte Carlo simulation at each reporting period based on the estimated probability of achieving the earn-out targets and applying a discount rate that measures the risk associated with the expected contingent payments. Changes in the fair value can result from changes pertaining to the achievement of the defined milestones and changes in assumed discount rates. Changes in the fair value of contingent consideration are recorded in our consolidated statements of (loss) income and comprehensive (loss) income. To the extent our estimates change in the future regarding the likelihood of achieving these targets, we would need to record adjustments to our contingent consideration liabilities. The inputs used to calculate the fair value of the contingent consideration liabilities are considered to be Level 3 inputs due to the lack of relevant market activity and significant management judgment. See Note 3, Fair Value Measurement, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, for additional disclosure regarding fair value of financial instruments.

Intangible Assets-Net

We test the recoverability of its intangible assets with finite useful lives whenever events or changes in circumstances indicate that the carrying value of the asset may not be recoverable. We test for recoverability based on the projected undiscounted cash flows to be derived from such asset. If the projected undiscounted future cash flows are less than the carrying value of the asset, we will record an impairment loss, if any, based on the difference between the estimated fair value and the carrying value of the asset. We generally measure fair value by considering sale prices for similar assets or by discounting estimated future cash flows from such asset using an appropriate discount rate. Cash flow projections and fair value estimates require significant estimates and assumptions by management. Should the estimates and assumptions prove to be incorrect, we may be required to record impairments in future periods and such impairments could be material. 

Intangible assets are carried at cost, less accumulated amortization, unless a determination has been made that their value has been impaired. Intangible assets are amortized on a straight-line basis over their estimated useful lives of between five to fifteen years. We review identifiable amortizable intangible assets to be held and used for impairment whenever events or changes in circumstances indicate that the carrying value of the assets may not be recoverable. Determination of recoverability is based on the lowest level of identifiable estimated undiscounted cash flows resulting from use of the asset and its eventual disposition. Measurement of any impairment loss is based on the excess of the carrying value of the asset over its fair value. There were no impairment charges recorded in the fiscal years ended July 31, 2023 and 2022 presented in the accompanying consolidated financial statements.

Goodwill

Goodwill represents the excess of purchase price and related costs over the fair value of assets acquired and liabilities assumed of the business acquired. Under ASC 350, Intangibles-Goodwill and Other, goodwill is not amortized, but instead is tested for impairment annually, or if certain circumstances indicate a possible impairment may exist.

We test goodwill for impairment on the first day of the fourth fiscal quarter or upon the occurrence of events or changes in circumstances that indicate that the asset might be impaired. Goodwill is assigned to our reporting units, which are our operating segments, or components of an operating segment, that constitute a business for which discrete financial information is available, and for which segment management regularly reviews the operating results. During the annual impairment review process we have the option to first perform a qualitative assessment (commonly referred to as “step zero”) over relative events and circumstances to determine whether it is more likely than not that the fair value of a reporting unit is less than its carrying value or to perform a quantitative assessment (“step one”) where we estimate the fair value of each reporting unit using primarily a market capitalization approach.

We would recognize an impairment charge for the amount by which the carrying amount exceeds the reporting unit’s fair value; however, the loss recognized would not exceed the total amount of goodwill allocated to that reporting unit. Additionally, we consider income tax effects from any tax-deductible goodwill on the carrying amount of its reporting unit when measuring the goodwill impairment loss, if applicable.

We performed an interim impairment test during the third quarter of fiscal 2023 and concluded that the carrying value of the GuruShots reporting unit exceeded its fair value. Accordingly, we recorded a non-cash goodwill impairment charge of $8.7 million during the third quarter of fiscal 2023. See Note 7, Intangible Assets-Net and Goodwill, for additional information) to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Capitalized software and technology development costs

Software and technology development activities generally fall into three stages:

During the Planning Stage, we charge all costs to expense as incurred.

During the Application and Infrastructure Development Stage, we begin to capitalize costs when the project has been properly authorized and we determine that completion is probable. If a project is subsequently cancelled prior to placement in service, costs that have been capitalized to date will be reviewed for potential impairment. Capitalization ceases no later than the point at which a computer software project is substantially complete and ready for its intended use. Amortization, which is generally over three years, begins for each project when the code is ready for use, whether or not it is actually placed in service at that time (an exception being if the project’s functionality completely depends on the completion of another project, in which case, amortization begins when that other project is ready for use).

During the Post-Implementation/Operating Stage, we expense training costs and maintenance costs as incurred. However, upgrades and enhancements, defined as modifications to existing internal-use software that result in additional functionality (modifications to enable the software to perform tasks that it was previously incapable of performing, normally requiring new software specifications and perhaps a change to all or part of the existing software specifications) are treated as though they were new projects, and are assessed utilizing the same stages and criteria on a project-by-project basis. As such, internal costs incurred for upgrades and enhancements are expensed or capitalized based on the requirements noted above, while costs incurred for maintenance are expensed as incurred. These projects are tracked individually, such that the beginning and ending of the capitalization can be appropriately established, as well as the amounts capitalized therein.

Amortization of these costs is included in depreciation and amortization in the statement of comprehensive income.

Stock-Based Compensation

We account for our share-based compensation arrangements in accordance with ASC 718, “Compensation-Stock Compensation” (“ASC 718”) which requires the measurement and recognition of compensation expense for all share-based payment awards to employees and directors based on estimated fair values on the grant date. Compensation cost for awards is recognized using the straight-line method over the vesting period or the graded vesting method if awards with market or performance conditions include graded vesting features or if an award includes both a service condition and a market or performance condition. Stock-based compensation is included in selling, general and administrative expense in the consolidated statements of (loss) income and comprehensive (loss) income.

See Note 1, Description of Business and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Part II, Item 8 of this Annual Report, for discussion of new accounting pronouncements.

Geo-Political and Macroeconomic Conditions and the COVID-19 Pandemic

We are subject to risks and uncertainties caused by events with significant macroeconomic impacts, including but not limited to, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, rising interest rates, actions taken to counter inflation, reduced consumer confidence, supply side disruptions, and the COVID-19 pandemic. The future and full impact that these factors may have on our business, financial condition, and results of operations is unclear. The risks related to our business are further described in the section titled “Risk Factors” in Part II, Item 1A of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q and those discussed under Item 1A to Part I “Risk Factors” in the Form 10-K.

Impact of Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine

We are closely monitoring the current and potential impact on our business, our people, and our users/customers as Russia’s war with Ukraine evolves. We have taken steps to comply with applicable domestic and international regulatory restrictions on international trade and financial transactions. Revenues associated with our users/customers in Russia and Belarus are not material to our consolidated financial results, and we anticipate that blocking Russian and Belarus users/customers’ access to our mobile app and web platforms will not have a material impact on our business. Management and our Board of Directors are monitoring the regional and global ramifications of the continuing events.

Impact of Israel-Hamas War

Given our operations in Israel, the impact of economic, political, geopolitical, and military conditions in the region directly affects us, including conflicts involving missile strikes, infiltrations, and terrorism. Notably, on October 7, 2023, Hamas launched attacks in southern Israel, resulting in casualties and military engagement. In addition, Hezbollah, another terrorist organization based in Lebanon has been indiscriminately shelling Israel. The extent and duration of this conflict remain uncertain, potentially involving other groups. Israel’s response led to the mobilization of reservists, affecting our workforce. Prior to this, changes in Israel’s judicial system had already raised concerns about the business environment, compounded by recent events, potentially impacting foreign investment, currency fluctuations, credit ratings, interest rates, and security markets. Furthermore, regional political unrest and threats from extremist groups, notably Iran, pose additional risks. Management and our Board of Directors are closely monitoring the situation in Israel to address potential business disruptions and implications.

COVID-19 Update

Although the World Health Organization declared in early May of 2023 that COVID-19 no longer constitutes a public health emergency we continue to actively monitor the COVID-19 developments and potential impact on our employees, business and operations. The effects of COVID-19 did not have a material impact on our result of operations or financial condition for the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023. However, given the evolution of the COVID-19 situation, and the global responses to curb its spread, we are not able to estimate the effects COVID-19 may have on our future results of operations or financial condition.

Key Performance Indicators

Our results of operations discussion includes disclosure of two key performance indicators - Monthly Active Users (MAU) and Average Revenue Per Monthly Active User (ARPMAU). MAU is a key performance indicator that captures the number of unique users that used our Zedge App in the last thirty days of the relevant period, which is important to understanding the size of the user base for our Zedge App which is a significant driver of revenue. Changes and trends in MAU are useful for measuring the general health of our business, gauging both present and potential customers’ experience, assessing the efficacy of product improvements and marketing campaigns and overall user engagement. ARPMAU is valuable because it provides insight into how well we monetize our users and the changes and trends in ARPMAU are indications of how effective our monetization investments are.

As of July 31, 2023 MAU declined 3.4% year over year primarily to attrition in both developed markets and emerging markets. Additionally, we have experienced a continuing shift in the regional customer make-up with MAU in emerging markets (particularly India) representing an increasing portion of our user base. As of July 31, 2023, users in emerging markets represented 78% of our MAU compared to 77% a year prior. This shift has negatively impacted revenue because advertising rates in emerging markets are materially lower than in well-developed markets.

ARPMAU declined 5.5% for the three months ended July 31, 2023 when compared to the same period a year ago, primarily due to macroeconomic condition that impacted our advertising revenue and subscription revenue.

The following tables present the MAU – Zedge App and ARPMAU – Zedge App for the three months ended July 31, 2023 as compared to the same period a year ago:

The following charts present the MAU – Zedge App and ARPMAU – Zedge App for the consecutive eight fiscal quarters ended July 31, 2023:

GuruShots-MAPs and ARPMAP

Monthly Active Payers (“MAPs”). We define a MAP as a unique active user on the GuruShots app or GuruShots.com in a month that completed at least one in-app purchase (“IAP”) during that time period. MAPs for a time period longer than one month are the average MAPs for each month during that period. We estimate the number of MAPs by aggregating certain data from third-party attribution platforms.

Average Revenue Per Monthly Active Payer (“ARPMAP”). We define ARPMAP as (i) the total revenue from IAPs derived from GuruShots and GuruShots.com in a monthly period, divided by (ii) MAPs in that same period. ARPMAP for a particular time period longer than one month is the average ARPMAP for each month during that period. ARPMAP shows how efficiently we are monetizing each MAP.

The following table shows our MAP and ARPMAP for the three months ended July 31, 2023 and 2022.

The following charts present the MAP and ARPMAP – GuruShots for the consecutive eight quarters ended July 31, 2023:

Our KPIs related to GuruShots are not based on any standardized industry methodology and are not necessarily calculated in the same manner that other companies or third parties may use to calculate these or similarly titled measures. The numbers that we use to calculate MAP and ARPMAP are derived from data that we generate internally. While these numbers are based on what we believe to be reasonable judgments and estimates for the applicable period of measurement, there are inherent challenges in measuring usage and engagement. We regularly review and may adjust our processes for calculating our internal metrics to improve their accuracy.

RESULTS OF OPERATIONS

The following table sets forth certain of our consolidated results of operations data for the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023 compared to the fiscal year ended July 31, 2022:

nm-not meaningful

The following table sets forth the composition of our revenues for the fiscal years ended July 31, 2023 and 2022:

Advertising revenue. Advertising revenue decreased 10% from $20.3 million in fiscal 2022 to $18.3 million in fiscal 2023 primarily due to lower media advertising spending caused by negative macroeconomic conditions, including related to rising interest rate and recession concerns.

Paid subscription revenue. Gross subscription revenue on the Android platform decreased 8% to $3.3 million in fiscal 2023 from $3.6 million in fiscal 2022. Subscription revenue recognized on the Android platform also decreased 8% to $3.4 million in fiscal 2023 from $3.7 million in fiscal 2022. Our active subscriptions decreased by 65,000 or 9% from 692,000 as of July 31, 2022 to 627,000 as of July 31, 2023 primarily due to the new subscriptions not offsetting churn, and our average active subscribers decreased by 11% during the same period. Our average monthly revenue per active subscription increased 4.8% to $0.44 in fiscal 2023 from $0.42 in fiscal 2022 due to revenue mix (more monthly subscriptions in fiscal 2023 compared to fiscal 2022). Beginning in August 2023, we rolled out lifetime subscriptions for Android users and the initial results were quite encouraging, although there can be no assurance that the trend will continue.

The following table summarizes subscriptions and subscription revenue from the Android platform for the fiscal years ended July 31, 2023 and 2022. We began our subscription offering on the iOS platform in late April 2023 and the associated revenue for the three months ended July 31, 2023 was not material.

Digital Goods and Services. Digital Goods and Services revenue were $4.6 million for the twelve months ended July 31, 2023 as compared to $1.7 million for the period from April 13, 2022 to July 31, 2022. Since the closing of the acquisition, GuruShots has experienced downward trajectory in both MAP and ARPMAP. As shown in the table above under the discussion of Key Performance Indicators, MAP and ARPMAP declined 22% and 10% respectively for the three months ended July 31, 2023 when compared to the same period a year ago. The decline in MAP can be attributed primarily to Apple’s App Tracking Transparence (“ATT”) framework which impeded our ability to invest in paid user acquisition (“PUA”) campaigns profitably in terms of return on ad spend or (“ROAS”). As such, we scaled back our PUA spend for GuruShots in fiscal 2023 while continuously testing with new campaigns and creatives in order to unearth attractive ROAS scaling opportunities. The decline in ARPMAP was primarily due to the negative macroeconomic conditions caused by the rising interest rate and recession fear throughout fiscal 2023.

Other Revenue. Other revenue consists primarily of Zedge Premium revenue. Zedge Premium gross revenue increased 2.3% while net revenue was flat year over year. The following table summarizes Zedge Premium gross and net revenue for the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023 and 2022.

Direct cost of revenues. Direct cost of revenues consists primarily of content hosting, content serving and filtering, and data analytic tools.

Direct cost of revenues increased 37% in fiscal 2023 to $2.2 million from $1.6 million in fiscal 2022, primarily attributable to the full year effect of the cloud hosting costs related to GuruShots.

As a percentage of revenue, direct cost of revenues in fiscal 2023 were 8.2% as compared to 6.2% in fiscal 2022. The higher percentage in fiscal 2023 can be attributed to GuruShots’ lower revenue base and relatively high direct cost of revenues.

Selling, general and administrative expense. Selling, general and administrative expense (“SG&A”) consists mainly of payroll, benefits, facilities, marketing (primarily PUA), consulting, professional fees, software licensing (“SaaS”) and public company related expenses. 

SG&A expense increased 45%, or $6.8 million in fiscal 2023 to $21.9 million from $15.1 million in fiscal 2022. This increase was primarily attributable to the effect of consolidating GuruShots’ operating results for twelve months in fiscal 2023 versus the period from April 13, 2022 to July 31, 2022. Stock-based compensation as discussed below, PUA, higher professional and consulting fees also contributed in part to the increase in SG&A year over year. We started investing in PUA during fiscal 2023 to counter the decline in organic installs of our Zedge App. We expect to increase our PUA spend in fiscal 2024 provided the ROAS remains compelling.

As a percentage of our total revenue, SG&A expense in fiscal 2023 was 80.2% as compared to 56.7% in fiscal 2022. The higher percentage in fiscal 2023 can be attributed to the full year effect of consolidating GuruShots’ operations in fiscal 2023 as compared to a short year period in fiscal 2022 (April 13, 2022 to July 31, 2022).

Our headcount totaled 94 as of July 31, 2023, relatively stable from the staffing level as of July 31, 2022. The majority of our employees are based in Lithuania and Israel.

SG&A expense also included stock-based compensation expense including equity grants to employees and consultants, as well as stock issuances to pay for board compensations and 401(k) matching contributions. Certain stock options, deferred stock unit and restricted stock grants are more fully described in Note 13, Stock-Based Compensation, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Part II, Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

The following table summarizes stock-based compensation expense for the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023 and 2022.

Stock-based compensation expense increased $0.6 million or 30% in fiscal 2023 to $2.5 million from $1.9 million in fiscal 2022 primarily due to the equity-based compensation expenses related to the restricted stock issued in connection with the GuruShots acquisition.

Depreciation and amortization. Depreciation and amortization expense consists mainly of amortization of intangible assets related to the GuruShots and Emojipedia acquisitions, capitalized software and technology development costs of our internal developers on various projects that we invested in specific to the various platforms on which we operate our mobile app service.

Depreciation and amortization expense increased $1.3 million or 66 % in fiscal 2023 to $3.2 million from $2.0 million in fiscal 2022, primarily due to the amortization of intangible assets acquired in connection with the GuruShots acquisition.

Goodwill impairment. We performed an interim impairment assessment during the Q3 of fiscal 2023 and determined that the fair value of the GuruShots reporting unit exceeded its carrying value and recorded a $8.7 million goodwill impairment charge in the three months ended April 30, 2023. Please see Note 7, Intangible Assets, Net and Goodwill, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Part II, Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K for additional information.

Contingent Consideration Fair Value Change. During fiscal 2023, we recorded a $1.9 million net benefit related to the change in fair value of our contingent consideration payable (related to the GuruShots acquisition) in addition to the $4.0 million net benefit recorded in fiscal 2022. In effect, we reduced the amount payable from $5.9 million to $0, due to the decrease in the likelihood that certain contingent milestones would be achieved. 

Interest and other income, net. The increase in interest and other income, net in fiscal 2023 when compared to fiscal 2022 was primarily due to higher interest rates earned on our cash balances in fiscal 2023 compared to fiscal 2022.

Net income (loss) resulting from foreign exchange transactions. Net income (loss) resulting from foreign exchange transactions is comprised of gains and losses generated from movements in Norwegian Krone (“NOK”) and Euros (“EUR”) relative to the U.S. Dollar, including gains or losses from our currency hedging activities.

nm-not meaningful

In fiscal 2023 and 2022, we incurred income of $14,000 and losses of $368,000, respectively, from NOK and EUR hedging activities.

(Benefit from) provision for income taxes. During fiscal 2023, we had pretax loss of about $6.6 million in respect of which we accrued $0.5 million in income tax benefit, an effective tax rate of 7.0% which is lower than the statutory rate primarily due to the $8.7 million goodwill impairment charge and $1.9 million change in fair value of contingent consideration. During fiscal 2022, we had pretax income of about $11.6 million in respect of which we accrued $1.9 million in income tax expenses, an effective tax rate of 16.3% which is lower than the statutory rate primarily due to the $4.0 million change in fair value of contingent consideration.

See Note 12, Income Taxes, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Part II, Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, for information regarding income taxes.

nm-not meaningful

Comparison of our Segment Results of Operations

The following table presents the results for our Zedge Marketplace and GuruShots segment income (loss) from operations for the fiscal years ended July 31, 2023 and 2022:

nm-not meaningful

Our income from operations related to the Zedge Marketplace decreased 34.0% to $6.3 million in fiscal 2023 from $9.6 million in fiscal 2022, primarily due to 1) lower advertising revenue resulting from MAU decline in well-developed countries and lower eCPMs, 2) lower subscription revenue as discussed earlier, and 3) higher operating expenses attributable to higher compensation costs (including stock-based compensation), PUA expenses, and professional fees.

Our loss from operations related to GuruShots was $13.2 million for the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023, including goodwill impairment charge of $8.7 million and changes in fair value of contingent consideration of $1.9 million. Excluding these two items loss from operations related to GuruShots would have been $6.4 million for fiscal 2023. GuruShots continued to underperform due primarily to lower revenue from existing users and adding fewer new users to the platform which resulted in lower MAP and lower ARPMAP when compared to prior periods.

Our income from operations related to GuruShots was $2.3 million for the period from April 13, 2022 to July 31, 2022, including changes in fair value of contingent consideration of $4.0 million. Excluding this item loss from operations related to GuruShots would have been $1.7 million for that period in fiscal 2022.

GuruShots’ operating results are consolidated with our operating results beginning on April 13, 2022. Therefore, our consolidated results of operations for the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023 may not be comparable to the corresponding periods in fiscal 2022. Please refer to the unaudited pro forma consolidated financial information contained in Note 6, Business Combination and Assets Acquisition, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Part II, Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

LIQUIDITY AND CAPITAL RESOURCES

General

At July 31, 2023, we had cash and cash equivalents of $18.1 million and working capital (current assets less current liabilities) of $16.0 million. We currently expect that our cash and cash equivalents on hand, and our cash flow from operations will be sufficient to meet our anticipated cash requirements for the twelve months following issuance of this annual report on Form 10-K.

The following tables present selected financial information for the fiscal years ended July 31, 2023 and 2022:

Operating Activities

Our cash flow from operating activities varies significantly from quarter to quarter and from year to year, depending on our operating results and the timing of operating cash receipts and payments, specifically trade accounts receivable and trade accounts payable. Cash provided by operating activities decreased $8.3 million to $3.2 million in fiscal 2023 from $11.5 million in fiscal 2022, primarily attributable to the operating losses from GuruShots in fiscal 2023, see Note 15, Segment and Geographic Information, to the consolidated financial statements in Part II, Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Changes in Trade Accounts Receivable

Gross trade accounts receivables were $2.9 million and $2.4 million at July 31, 2023 and 2022 respectively. Our cash collections in fiscal 2023 and fiscal 2022 were $24.8 million and $26.0 million, respectively.

Investing Activities

On April 12, 2022, we acquired 100% of the outstanding equity securities of GuruShots. The purchase price consists of $18 million in cash paid at closing and contingent payments (the “Earnout”) of up to a maximum of $16.8 million, payable either in cash or Class B common stock of the Company or a combination thereof (in the Company’s discretion) payable over two years from closing subject to GuruShots achieving certain financial targets set forth in the Share Purchase Agreement (“SPA”). In connection therewith, we agreed to make certain minimum investments in user acquisition for GuruShots in the period covered by the Earnout, subject to GuruShots maintaining agreed upon levels of return on ad spend (ROAS) and other conditions. In addition, we committed to a retention pool of $4 million in cash and 626,242 shares of the Company Class B common stock with a fair value of $4 million or $6.39 per share for GuruShots’ founders and other employees that will be payable or vest, as applicable, over three years from closing based on the beneficiaries thereof remaining employed by the Company or a subsidiary.

On August 1, 2021, we acquired substantially all of the assets of Emojipedia Pty Ltd, a proprietary company organized under the laws of Australia. The final purchase price of the assets was determined to be $6.7 million of which $4.8 million was paid on August 2, 2021 with the remaining $1.9 million to be paid out on the six-month and twelve-month anniversary of the Closing. We paid approximately half of the $1.9 million on February 1, 2022 and the remaining amount was paid on August 1, 2022.

Business combination and assets acquisition are more fully described in Note 6, Business Combination and Asset Acquisition, to the Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8 of this annual report on Form 10-K.

Cash used in investing activities in the fiscal years ended July 31, 2023 and 2022 also consisted of capitalized software and technology development costs related to various projects that we invested in specific to the various platforms on which we operate our service.

Financing Activities

On October 28, 2022, we entered into an Amended Loan Agreement with Western Alliance Bank. Pursuant to the Amended Loan Agreement, Western Alliance Bank agreed to provide the Company with a new term loan facility in the maximum principal amount of $7,000,000 for a four-year term and a $4,000,000 revolving credit facility for a two-year term. At our request, the maximum principal amount of the term loan was reduced to $2 million as of May 11, 2023. Pursuant to the Amended Loan Agreement, $2,000,000 was advanced in a single-cash advance on the closing date on October 28, 2022. As of July 31, 2023, there were no availability under the term loan facility.

We discontinued the existing $2,000,000 revolving credit facility under the existing Loan and Security Agreement, dated as of September 26, 2016. At both July 31, 2022 and the time of the discontinuance on October 28, 2022, there was no outstanding balance on the revolving credit facility.

In connection with the share repurchase program as in Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities, we bought back 752,687 shares for approximately $1.6 million in fiscal 2023, including commission and banking fees of approximately $15,000.

In fiscal 2023, we received proceeds of $1,785 from the exercise of stock options for which the Company issued 1,500 shares of its Class B common stock. In fiscal 2022, the Company received proceeds of $8,631 from the exercise of stock options for which the Company issued 5,166 shares of its Class B common stock. 

In fiscal 2023 and 2022, we purchased 6,310 shares and 16,115 shares respectively of Class B Stock from certain employees for $17,000 and $232,000 respectively, to satisfy tax withholding obligations in connection with the vesting of restricted stock and DSUs.

We do not anticipate paying dividends on our common stock until we achieve sustainable profitability and retain certain minimum cash reserves. The payment of dividends in any specific period will be at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

Concentration of Credit Risk and Significant Customers

Historically, we have had very little or no bad debt, which is common with other platforms of our size that derive their revenue from digital advertising, as we aggressively manage our collections and perform due diligence on our customers. In addition, the majority of our revenue is derived from large, credit-worthy customers, e.g. MoPub (owned by X, formerly known as Twitter, and sold to AppLovin in January 2022), Google and Meta, and we terminate our services with smaller customers immediately upon balances becoming past due. Since these smaller customers rely on us to derive their own revenue, they generally pay their outstanding balances on a timely basis.

In the fiscal year ended July 31, 2023, two customers represented 26% and 16% of our revenue. In the fiscal year ended July 31, 2022, two customers represented 28% and 15% of our revenue. At July 31, 2023, two customers represented 36% and 18% of our accounts receivable balance and at July 31, 2022, three customers represented 41%, 17% and 16% of our accounts receivable balance. All of these significant customers are advertising exchanges operated by leading companies, and the receivables represent many smaller amounts due from advertisers.

CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS AND OTHER COMMERCIAL COMMITMENTS

In connection with the acquisition of GuruShots, the Company has (i) committed to a retention pool of $4 million in cash to be paid to the founders and employees of GuruShots that will be payable over three years from April 1, 2022 based on the beneficiaries thereof remaining employed by the Company or a subsidiary; and (ii) agreed to make certain minimum investments in user acquisition for GuruShots in the period covered by the earnout to be contingently paid to the prior owners of GuruShots subject to the acquired users generating minimum levels of ROAS. The Company was prepared to make the minimum investment, however, GuruShots was unable to achieve those minimum ROAS target conditions. GuruShots’ financial performance during the period from the April 2022 acquisition through July 31, 2023, was materially impacted by a combination of industry specific, macroeconomic, and geopolitical challenges that contributed to negatively impacting ROAS. The conditions for payment of the Earnout for the first year following the acquisition were not met and no Earnout payment was made or accrued.

OFF-BALANCE SHEET ARRANGEMENTS

At July 31, 2023, we did not have any “off-balance sheet arrangements,” as defined in relevant SEC regulations that are reasonably likely to have a current or future effect on our financial condition, results of operations, liquidity, capital expenditures or capital resources, other than the following:

In connection with our Spin-Off on June 1, 2016, we and IDT entered into various agreements prior to the Spin-Off including a Separation and Distribution Agreement to effect the separation and provide a framework for our relationship with IDT after the Spin-Off, and a Tax Separation Agreement, which sets forth the responsibilities of us and IDT with respect to, among other things, liabilities for federal, state, local and foreign taxes for periods before and including the Spin-Off, the preparation and filing of tax returns for such periods and disputes with taxing authorities regarding taxes for such periods. Pursuant to the Separation and Distribution Agreement, among other things, we indemnify IDT and IDT indemnifies us for losses related to the failure of the other to pay, perform or otherwise discharge, any of the liabilities and obligations set forth in the agreement. Pursuant to the Tax Separation Agreement, among other things, IDT indemnifies us from all liability for taxes of ours and any of our subsidiaries or relating to our business with respect to taxable periods ending on or before the Spin-Off, and we indemnify IDT from all liability for taxes of ours and any of our subsidiaries or relating to our business accruing after the Spin-Off. Notwithstanding the foregoing, we are responsible for, and IDT has no obligation to indemnify us for, any tax liability of ours resulting from an audit, examination or other proceeding related to any tax returns that relate solely to us and our subsidiaries regardless of whether such tax return relates to a period prior to or following the Spin-Off.

Item 7A. Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures about Market Risks.

Smaller reporting companies are not required to provide the information required by this item.

Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data. 

The Consolidated Financial Statements of the Company and the report of the independent registered public accounting firm thereon starting on page F-1 are included herein.

Item 9. Changes in and Disagreements with Accountants on Accounting and Financial Disclosure. 

None.

Item 9A. Controls and Procedures.

Evaluation of Disclosure Controls and Procedures 

Our Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer have evaluated the effectiveness of our disclosure controls and procedures (as defined in Rules 13a-15(e) and 15d-15(e) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended), as of the end of the period covered by this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Based on this evaluation, our Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer have concluded that our disclosure controls and procedures were effective as of July 31, 2023.

Report of Management on Internal Control over Financial Reporting

We, the management of Zedge, Inc. and subsidiaries (the “Company”), are responsible for establishing and maintaining adequate internal control over financial reporting of the Company.

The Company’s internal control over financial reporting is defined in Rule 13a-15(f) and 15d-15(f) promulgated under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 as a process designed by, or under the supervision of, the Company’s principal executive and principal financial officers and effected by the Company’s board of directors, management and other personnel, to provide reasonable assurance regarding the reliability of financial reporting and the preparation of the Company’s financial statements for external purposes in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States and includes those policies and procedures that:

Management has assessed the effectiveness of the Company’s internal control over financial reporting as of July 31, 2023. In making this assessment, the Company’s management used the criteria established in Internal Control — Integrated Framework (2013) issued by the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission.

Under the supervision and with the participation of our management, including our principal executive officer and principal financial officer, we conducted an evaluation of our internal control over financial reporting, as prescribed above, as of July 31, 2023. Based on our evaluation, our principal executive officer and principal financial officer concluded that the Company’s internal control over financial reporting was effective as of July 31, 2023.

Changes in Internal Control over Financial Reporting 

There were no changes in our internal control over financial reporting during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2023 that have materially affected, or are reasonably likely to materially affect, our internal control over financial reporting.

Item 9B. Other Information. 

None.

Item 9C. Disclosure Regarding Foreign Jurisdictions that Prevent Inspections.

Not applicable.

PART III

Item 10. Directors and Executive Officers of the Registrant, and Corporate Governance

The following is a list of our directors and executive officers along with the specific information required by Rule 14a-3 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934:

Executive Officers

Jonathan Reich – Chief Executive Officer and President

Yi Tsai – Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer

Michael Jonas – Executive Chairman

Directors

Michael Jonas, Chairman of the Board

Howard Jonas, Vice Chairman of the Board

Mark Ghermezian

Elliot Gibber

Paul Packer

Gregory Suess

The remaining information required by this Item will be contained in our Proxy Statement for our Annual Stockholders Meeting, which will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 120 days after July 31, 2023, and which is incorporated by reference herein.

Corporate Governance

We have included as exhibits to this Annual Report on Form 10-K certificates of our Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer certifying the quality of our public disclosure.

We make available free of charge through the investor relations page of our web site (investor.zedge.net) our Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and all amendments to those reports, and all beneficial ownership reports on Forms 3, 4 and 5 filed by directors, officers and beneficial owners of more than 10% of our equity, as soon as reasonably practicable after such reports are electronically filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We have adopted codes of business conduct and ethics for all of our employees, including our principal executive officer, principal financial officer and principal accounting officer. Copies of the codes of business conduct and ethics are available on our web site.

Our web site and the information contained therein or incorporated therein are not intended to be incorporated into this Annual Report on Form 10-K or our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Item 11. Executive Compensation

The information required by this Item will be contained in our Proxy Statement for our Annual Stockholders Meeting, which will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 120 days after July 31, 2023, and which is incorporated by reference herein.

Item 12. Security Ownership of Certain Beneficial Owners and Management and Related Stockholder Matters

The information required by this Item will be contained in our Proxy Statement for our Annual Stockholders Meeting, which will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 120 days after July 31, 2023, and which is incorporated by reference herein.

Item 13. Certain Relationships and Related Transactions, and Director Independence

The information required by this Item will be contained in our Proxy Statement for our Annual Stockholders Meeting, which will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 120 days after July 31, 2023, and which is incorporated by reference herein.

Item 14. Principal Accounting Fees and Services

The information required by this Item will be contained in our Proxy Statement for our Annual Stockholders Meeting, which will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 120 days after July 31, 2023, and which is incorporated by reference herein.

PART IV

Item 15. Exhibits, Financial Statement Schedules.

Consolidated Financial Statements covered by Report of Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm

All schedules have been omitted since they are either included in the Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements or not required or not applicable.

The exhibits listed in paragraph (b) of this item are filed, furnished, or incorporated by reference as part of this Form 10-K.

Certain of the agreements filed as exhibits to this Form 10-K contain representations and warranties by the parties to the agreements that have been made solely for the benefit of the parties to the agreement. These representations and warranties:

Accordingly, these representations and warranties may not describe the actual state of affairs as of the date that these representations and warranties were made or at any other time. Investors should not rely on them as statements of fact.