Appian Corp at Goldman Sachs Communacopia & Technology Conference Transcript

The following is excerpted from the question-and-answer section of the transcript.

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Great. Appian has, I think, just hit its 25th anniversary. And so I thought it would be useful, given the long history of the company, maybe just a brief overview of Appian, how the product set has kind of evolved over the years, and the value prop to the enterprise base that you serve?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. That's a great overview. Maybe to follow up on that. You serve a couple of core verticals, but if you can provide just an example maybe of a recent customer win, how you came on, what was the problem that you solved in the use case for that customer?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : No, that's great. Maybe shifting gears a little bit on -- we get this question a lot, just given your role interfacing customers, maybe talk a bit about just macro. What are you seeing from a buying perspective? Willingness to -- these are very mission-critical kind of applications, right? And so what's the willingness right now within that enterprise base to kind of modernize these systems? REFINITIV STREETEVENTS | www.refinitiv.com | Contact Us consent of Refinitiv. 'Refinitiv' and the Refinitiv logo are registered trademarks of Refinitiv and its affiliated companies. SEPTEMBER 11, 2024 / 11:25PM, APPN.OQ - Appian Corp at Goldman Sachs Communacopia & Technology Conference

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : So I want to dig into the AI topic for sure in a minute, but maybe sticking to the customer profile, I guess you talked about some of the verticals Appian is strong in. What's the ideal customer for Appian? And I think that's evolved over the last couple of years. So maybe talk a bit about kind

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : And it seems like there's a trend here where some of your biggest customers, the ones who have already found lot of value with the platform, they're growing really nicely. And so curious how the firm thinks about kind of expansion within those really critical large customers versus net new? Is there kind of a balance there? How do you guys think about kind of that expansion motion versus net new logo growth?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : So I wanted to shift to maybe go-to-market. I know last earnings, you discussed some changes there. I guess maybe run through kind of what changed? What were the metrics that you saw that made you want to make those changes and maybe any updates to the go-to-market since then?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. I guess maybe on that point, I think there were some incremental headcount reductions. But as you think about kind of sales capacity and as your sales force gets more tenured, do you have kind of a high-level way of thinking about sales productivity? Do you have the right capacity to meet those growth targets? I guess what's kind of the framework there?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : So I want to ask about, I guess, the Appian secret sauce, the differentiation. I think Marc, you kind of touched on this a little bit. It's a workflow automation tool. There's a lot of ways of leveraging the platform, you have kind of solutions out there that's for common use cases, but I guess maybe talk about the differentiation versus maybe other vendors in the space and where you've had really good success in terms of kind of common use cases?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : I guess on the point of competition, has that been kind of the same for a while? Like I get asked often about bigger vendors, even Salesforce or ServiceNow. So maybe just talk about the evolution of the competitive landscape, who do you see most often, and if that's changed over time?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. I wanted to ask about the solution -- I guess, the pre-built solutions. I know you've had good success on the government side, for example. I think you talked about the financial services. But maybe just talk about kind of the evolution there? How big of a growth contributor is that? And yeah, like I said, I think government is probably the most mature example of that, but do you see that kind of flowing into some of the other verticals as well?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. Got it. I wanted to ask about partners. I think there's been some changes in terms of the way you manage your partner relationships, maybe tightening the focus a bit. So maybe just walk through kind of the changes there and any early kind of learnings from the ships there?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Can you discuss the relationship Appian has with the cloud vendors? And how does Appian work with them from, I guess, a product integration perspective?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. Could -- maybe as you expand those relationships, could they potentially be distribution partners for Appian?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : So I wanted to maybe circle back on AI. You had talked about data fabric. It seems like that, especially with the net new customers, really strong adoption, I guess maybe help -- what are the implications of that? And the question I often get is, does this catalyze more demand, more activity, more applications being built? What are the ramifications for monetization? So if you can kind of maybe flesh that out a bit?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. I wanted to ask about profitability. Mark, you kind of touched on it a little bit. You've accelerated the timeline. We talked a little bit about sales productivity. Where else are you finding efficiencies in the model? And I guess, longer term, how do you think about kind of whether that's a Rule of 40 or some sort of operating framework, how are you kind of managing the business?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Yeah. I also wanted to ask about maybe shifting gears a little bit just on international. It seems like that's been a source of steady growth for a while. So maybe whether there's different dynamics there in terms of macro or buying patterns or whether it's just a smaller part of your business, and it's catching up. Anything you'd call out in terms of kind of the international market and kind of the adoption you're seeing there?

Question: Kevin Kumar - Goldman Sachs & Company, Inc. - Analyst : Maybe last one to close it out -- top priorities or aspirations for the firm over the next couple of years at Appian and maybe a different focus for both of you but kind of top priorities.