Insight certainty 4/5 debate potential 2/5

Casaretti: Billings serve as a leading indicator of SaaS revenue growth

Preeti Casaretti · a16z Podcast | Valuing Today's Fast-Growing Software Companies · Jan 2, 2019 · at 4:37

Preeti Casaretti of Andreessen Horowitz explains why software investors prioritize contracted billings over income statement revenue when evaluating SaaS businesses.

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“And that really is like a leading indicator of revenue growth, and that's why you see a lot of investors focusing on billings more so than revenue itself, because if Workday, for example, signs a severe contract with the customer, And they have that unearned revenue on the balance sheet, you know that that revenue is going to be coming in over the next three years.”

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Insight
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Assertion Not checkable as stated
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Assertion Not checkable as stated
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Prediction Not checkable as stated
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