Cerence (NASDAQ:CRNC) released third-quarter financial results and hosted an earnings call on Thursday. Read the complete transcript below.

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Summary

Cerence reported third quarter 2026 revenue of approximately $70 million, matching guidance, with adjusted EBITDA of $13.5 million, exceeding expectations. Free cash flow was $20 million, and recurring connected services revenue increased by over 20% year-over-year.

The company launched the XUI platform, now in its commercialization phase, and secured a significant deal with Stellantis. XUI is expected to support higher average prices per unit and contribute to revenue growth in fiscal year 2027.

Cerence announced its first share repurchase program, reflecting confidence in its financial health and strategic positioning. The company raised its fiscal year 2026 free cash flow guidance to between $76 million and $82 million.

In the automotive sector, Cerence is expanding its AI capabilities, securing several partnerships and contracts, including with JLR and BYD. The company is also progressing in non-automotive sectors, with initiatives like the Dealer Assistant Agent showing promising results.

Future outlook for fiscal year 2027 includes high single to low double-digit revenue growth, driven by XUI and connected services, with significant expansion expected in non-automotive areas.

Full Transcript

OPERATOR (Operator)

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Cerence third quarter 2026 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again.

Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Kate Hickman, Vice President of Corporate Communications and Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Kate Hickman, Vice President of Corporate Communications and Investor Relations

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Cerence's third quarter 2026 conference call. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that this call may involve certain forward-looking statements. Any statements that are not statements of historical fact, including statements related to our expectations, anticipations, intentions, estimates, assumptions, beliefs, outlook, strategies, goals, priorities, objectives, targets, and plans, are forward-looking statements.

Cerence makes no representations to update those statements after today. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties which may cause actual results to differ materially from such statements and expectations as described in our SEC filings, including the Form 8-K with the press release preceding today's call, our most recent Form 10-Q, and our Form 10-K filed on November 20, 2025. In addition, the company may refer to certain non-GAAP measures, key performance indicators, and pro forma financial information during this call.

Please refer to today's press release for further details of the definitions, limitations, and uses of those measures and reconciliations of non-GAAP measures to the closest GAAP equivalent. The press release is available in the Investor section of our website. Joining me on today's call are Brian Krzanich, CEO, and Tony Rodriguez, CFO. Please note that slides with further context are available in the Investor section of our website. Before handing the call over to Brian, I would like to mention that we will be participating in the Raymond James 2026 Industrial Showcase on August 13 and the Needham Virtual Semiconductor and Semi Cap Conference on August 19. Now, onto the call—Brian, thank you.

Stefan Ortmanns, Chief Executive Officer

Kate, and good afternoon everyone. Now, before we dig in, I'd like to briefly reflect on Cerence's progress as I approach my two-year anniversary as CEO in October. And when I stepped into the role, we established a clear roadmap. The first year was about strengthening the foundation of the business, improving our financial profile, restoring profitability, generating cash flow, and reducing debt. I believe we delivered on those commitments, and we said the second year would be about execution.

As we approach the end of fiscal year 26, I believe we have delivered there as well. We advanced our technology roadmap by bringing XUI from concept to production. We improved free cash flow, and we are continuing to create value for customers and shareholders. Most importantly, we're now beginning to see the early stages of our next chapter. XUI is entering into commercialization phase, our agentic AI portfolio is gaining traction, and our non-automotive initiatives are beginning to move from proof points toward revenue contribution.

We believe that our fiscal third quarter results demonstrate a company executing against its strategy, delivering strong financial performance, and positioning itself for future growth. In Q3, we delivered another strong quarter with revenue of approximately $70 million in line with our guidance, adjusted EBITDA above the high end of our guidance at $13.5 million, and free cash flow of $20 million. Importantly, we continue to grow our recurring connected services business, with revenue up more than 20% year over year.

This growth further increases the recurring quotient of our revenue mix, enhancing visibility into the future performance, and demonstrates the value of the connected platform we've built across our installed base. Looking ahead to the rest of the fiscal year, we're again raising our fiscal year 26 free cash flow guidance, now to $76 million to $82 million, and narrowing most of our remaining forecasts as we approach the end of fiscal year 26. Given the continued cash-generating strength of our business, I'd like to give an update on our capital allocation strategy.

As mentioned in the past, we have several core capital allocation priorities, all focused on delivering returns to our shareholders: investing organically to support growth, reducing debt, managing equity dilution, and selectively pursuing inorganic opportunities that can enhance our long-term growth and strategic position. We evaluate these priorities based on the opportunities available to us, the strength of our balance sheet, and where we believe capital can generate attractive risk-adjusted return for shareholders.

And with that, I'm pleased to share that our board has authorized Cerence's first ever share repurchase program. This reflects our confidence in the business, the progress we've made in improving profitability and cash generation, and our commitment to disciplined capital allocation as we look ahead. We remain focused on creating long-term shareholder value through execution, strategic investment, and prudent capital allocation. The stock repurchase program adds another tool to that approach while preserving our flexibility to continue investing in growth and reducing debt, while also helping to offset dilution, and Tony will provide further details on the program. Now turning to updates and highlights from the quarter, we continue to see strong investment in next-generation AI-powered user experiences. Automakers increasingly view AI not as a discretionary investment, but as a strategic priority that reinforces their competitive position. As vehicles become more software-defined, automakers are seeking differentiated user experiences that reinforce their brands, improve customer satisfaction, and create opportunities for recurring revenue.

That's where we believe Cerence AI continues to be uniquely positioned and why we continue to win. We combine decades of automotive expertise with leading AI capabilities, enabling OEMs to bring powerful conversational experiences to market while reducing complexity, cost, and execution risk. As a result, despite the dynamic industry that OEMs are navigating, customer engagement remains strong, our pipeline continues to develop, and interest in our next-generation platform is growing.

Cerence XUI, which is now available in nearly 20 languages, remains the center of our automotive strategy. In Q3, we signed a new XUI deal with Stellantis, who expects to deploy our platform across multiple brands and regions. With initial production having recently started, and throughout the quarter we continued to advance our XUI programs with JLR, a VW Group brand, BYD, Geely, and a major Japanese automaker. Several of these programs have started production or are expected to start production in fiscal Q4.

Today we have approximately 100,000 XUI-powered cars on the road, an important milestone in bringing this technology to market, and consistent with what we've said in the past, that XUI will begin its ramp at the end of 26 and impact revenue during fiscal year 27 and beyond as additional programs enter production and vehicle volume scale. And we continue to expect XUI deployments to support higher average price per unit, reflecting its broader functionality, increased software content, and expanding agentic capabilities, a testament to the value we're bringing to our customers.

Cerence AI was recognized at JLR's Global Supplier Excellence Awards in June. JLR honored us with their Exceptional Creator Recognition, a special category they introduced specifically to highlight truly outstanding partners. In their nominations, the JLR team highlighted how we fast-tracked our partnership into a true AI-era collaboration. They specifically called out Cerence's flexibility as a key enabler in their ability to adopt new AI capabilities faster and innovate with confidence.

That execution, paired with our disciplined delivery and sharp roadmap alignment, is now their blueprint for future-facing technology. We believe this recognition validates not only our technology but also our ability to serve as a trusted strategic partner as OEMs transition to next-generation AI platforms. During the quarter, we also advanced our agentic AI roadmap across parking, dining, and other task-oriented experiences. Our goal is to evolve the in-vehicle assistant from a system that primarily responds to requests into an agentic experience that can take action and help users complete tasks in context.

Of note, we reached an important milestone in this strategy in Q3 by signing the first customer for our Mobile Work Agent. Developed in collaboration with Microsoft, the customer is a global premium automaker and an existing Cerence customer, with rollout expected to begin in fiscal Q4. We believe this win is significant for two reasons. First, it demonstrates our ability to quickly deploy a complex agent that turns the car into a managed, trusted device with compliant access to enterprise tools in the Microsoft 365 suite.

Second, it validates our strategy to sell and deploy agents on a standalone basis. Not only can these agents be deployed within new XUI programs, but they can also be integrated into non-XUI programs and even competitive stacks. This expands our addressable opportunity and gives OEMs a flexible path to introduce agentic capabilities. We're in talks with several other automakers to deploy our Mobile Work Agent in the near future. Beyond XUI and our agent roadmap, we continue to win business across our broader technology portfolio.

During the quarter, we signed our first customer for Exterior Vehicle Interaction, which extends the reach of the vehicle's voice assistant outside the cabin, allowing drivers to use their voice to perform authenticated vehicle actions like unlocking doors or opening the trunk. We also secured wins across our stack with Subaru, HKMC, and GM. We signed an emergency vehicle detection program with a Chinese robotaxi company and a Cerence Assistant program with Stellantis for the vehicles that will not initially use XUI.

These programs have the potential to generate recurring business, maintain our seat at the table within the OEM technology stack, and create opportunities to expand our role over time even when customers use multiple technologies. We're also making progress in extending our voice, AI, and agentic capabilities beyond the vehicle. We continue to focus on complex environments similar to the car, including commercial and industrial operations, robotics, and select IoT applications.

We believe our products have the ability to serve as the trusted interaction layer across a broad range of verticals where our edge AI, reliability, services, security, and domain-specific integration translate well and provide a meaningful competitive advantage. One example of our progress is the launch of our Dealer Assistant Agent live at Infiniti of Grand Rapids, Michigan, targeting a real pain point for dealerships: missed and after-hours sales and service calls that can translate into lost leads and revenue.

Our AI agent provides an always-on instant response, serving as a virtual expert on vehicle features, scheduling test drives, and booking service appointments while freeing staff from routine, repetitive calls. Since the program went live, Dealer Assistant Agent has delivered measurable business impact to the customer, with 100% of after-hour calls now being captured. There's been a 20% increase in sales opportunities driven by always-on lead engagement and qualification, and nearly a 30% increase in service appointments booked, improving utilization and capturing additional service revenue.

While this is an early deployment, we believe that it demonstrates the impact our agentic solutions can deliver, and with tens of thousands of car dealerships worldwide, we see this as a promising growth opportunity. Consistent with our prior outlook, we expect approximately $7 million to $9 million in non-auto revenue forecasted for full fiscal 2026, and the larger opportunity ahead of us in fiscal year 27 and beyond. On our next earnings call, we look forward to providing you additional details on our fiscal year 2027 roadmap, forecast, and strategy for building a meaningful business beyond automotive.

Now, in terms of our intellectual property strategy and ongoing enforcement efforts, we continue to actively protect our technology and investments as part of the ordinary course of our business. While the timing of IP-related outcomes can be difficult to predict on a quarterly basis, we believe these efforts support our broader commitment to innovation and long-term shareholder value, and we'll continue to keep you posted as additional progress is made.

As we approach the end of fiscal 2026, I want to close with the four drivers that underpin our belief in Cerence's long-term value. First, that Cerence occupies an important position in the automotive AI stack, supported by deep OEM relationships and a large install base and durable recurring revenue. Second, our XUI and agentic AI wins provide an opportunity for ongoing growth and higher revenue per vehicle as these programs enter production and scale.

And third, we continue to deliver strong free cash flow while maintaining our focus on disciplined capital allocation. We believe that our business model supports debt reduction, balance sheet strength, inorganic growth, and the strategic and operational flexibility necessary to make key decisions like our stock repurchase program. And fourth, our expansion outside of automotive and our IP enforcement efforts provide additional sources of potential long-term value.

Now with that, I'll turn it over to Tony.

UNKNOWN, Chief Financial Officer

Thank you, Brian. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. We appreciate your continued interest in Cerence. Today I'll review our third quarter fiscal 2026 results, highlight the key drivers of the quarter, and then provide guidance for our fourth quarter and the resulting full fiscal year. For the quarter, total revenue was approximately $70 million, within our guidance range of $68 to $72 million and up 12% from $62 million in the prior-year period.

The increase was led by higher license revenue, including the timing of fixed license contract execution, and a positive shift to recurring connected services revenue. Total license revenue was $41.6 million, up 22% year over year, reflecting the higher fixed license contribution this quarter. Fixed license revenue was $12.5 million this quarter compared to no fixed license revenue in the prior-year period and above the approximately $10 million contemplated in our Q3 guidance.

As we have discussed, fixed license revenue can vary quarter to quarter based on the timing of contract execution. We do not expect any additional fixed license revenue for the remainder of the fiscal year. Variable license revenue for the quarter was $29.1 million, down 15% year over year. Two factors drove the decrease. First, the comparison was against an exceptionally strong prior-year quarter that benefited from higher-than-normal production as some manufacturers built ahead of anticipated tariff impacts and from favorable foreign exchange rates.

Second, our unit volumes came in below the broader market this quarter. Production of vehicles with Cerence technology was down 8% year over year, while global light vehicle production declined roughly 2% based on the customer production data available to us. The difference relative to the broader market primarily reflects our specific OEM and regional mix. Much of the global market's relative resilience came from regions where we have limited presence, such as South America and South Asia, while the OEMs and regions that represent the majority of our volume saw softer production.

This was compounded by a period of program life-cycle transition, with some programs winding down faster than their replacements are ramping. That said, we have not seen a change in pricing or economics to our existing programs, and we have continued to experience recent design win activity. Connected services revenue was $15.5 million, up 20% year over year, driven by continued expansion of our connected install base and a higher attach rate. We believe that this growth underscores the increasing importance of connected services revenue within our business model and provides improved visibility into future performance.

Professional services revenue was $12.5 million, down 18% year over year, reflecting our continued focus on standardization and higher-margin implementations as well as the impact of revenue deferrals when services are bundled with license arrangements. Gross margin for the quarter was 76% compared to 74% in the prior-year period and in line with the high end of our guidance range of 75% to 76%. The improvement over prior year was driven primarily by favorable revenue mix, including the higher fixed license contribution, along with continued discipline across cost of revenue.

Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $13.5 million, an increase of $4.5 million, or 51% year over year, and ahead of the high end of our guidance range of $8 to $12 million, with revenue finishing near the midpoint of our range. This outperformance was driven by favorable margin mix and operating expenses below plan. A portion of the expense variance was timing related and expected to normalize in the fourth quarter, while the remainder reflects our continued cost discipline.

Total non-GAAP operating expenses were $43 million compared to $40 million in the prior-year period. Non-GAAP R&D expenses were $26.5 million, up from $24.4 million, reflecting lower capitalization of internally developed software rather than an increase in overall investment. Total technology spending remained stable. Non-GAAP Sales and Marketing expense was $4.6 million, down year over year by about 8%, but consistent with continued investment to support our customer base and long-term growth initiatives.

Non-GAAP G&A expense was $11.5 million, up from $10.1 million, reflecting normalized general operating costs as well as additional legal expenses associated with our ongoing efforts to protect, enforce, and license our IP portfolio. Excluding the one-time legal costs incurred in Q1 to secure our patent license agreement with Samsung, we expect full-year fiscal 2026 IP-related legal costs of approximately $9 million. From a GAAP profitability perspective, Q3 net income was $1.5 million, with diluted EPS of $0.03, versus a net loss of $2.7 million and a net loss per share of $0.06 a year ago.

On taxes, the Samsung-related withholding tax is spread across the year through our estimated annual effective tax rate, so it isn't confined to the quarter in which it incurred. That front-loaded our tax expense in Q1 above the expected full-year total and impacts taxes even in quarters with little or no pre-tax income, like here. In Q3, we continue to model full-year tax expense of approximately $20 million, consistent with our prior projection range, with a significant tax benefit expected in Q4.

During Q3, we generated $20 million of cash from operations and $20 million of free cash flow, continuing our strong cash conversion performance. We ended the quarter with $128 million in cash and cash equivalents, which we believe provides significant flexibility to invest in our strategic priorities while further strengthening the balance sheet. As we evaluate capital allocation, we continue to maintain a strong financial position and invest in the business while deploying excess capital toward opportunities that offer the highest risk-adjusted returns.

In the current environment, that may include discounted debt repurchases, share repurchases, and selective strategic investments that support our long-term growth objectives. Putting that framework into action, earlier this fiscal year we repurchased a portion of our 2028 convertible notes at a discount to par, reducing interest expense and leverage. Building on that, as Brian mentioned, today we announced that our board has approved our first share repurchase program, authorizing the repurchase of up to $30 million of our common stock over the next 12 months.

We intend to execute through open market purchases funded from cash on hand and free cash flow, while preserving the flexibility to keep investing in the business and to address our remaining outstanding convertible notes. The program does not obligate us to repurchase any specific amount, and we expect to stay disciplined as we consider our capital allocation priorities. From a metric standpoint for Q3, production of vehicles with Cerence technology totaled 11.4 million in the quarter compared to 12.4 million a year ago.

Connected cars shipped increased 4% on a trailing 12-month basis, while recurring connected services revenue grew 20%, reflecting higher attach rates and per-unit economics. Adjusted total billings were $240 million, up 6% year over year. Pro forma royalties were $38 million compared to $43 million in the prior-year period, reflecting the lower production volumes. Fixed license consumption within that quarter total was $8.7 million. Before turning to guidance, let me put the XUI wins Brian discussed into financial context.

From an accounting perspective, we recognize revenue as licenses ship and as connected services are delivered, so new program wins flow through our reported results in stages rather than all at once. For multi-year platform transitions such as XUI, that cycle plays out over several years. As a result, the wins we've announced are not fully reflected in our current revenue run rate, and for connected services, the near-term impact will show up first in billings, with more meaningful revenue contribution phasing in during fiscal 2027 and beyond.

These programs carry attractive per-unit economics that we expect to support both revenue growth and margin as they scale. Also consistent with Brian's comments, our current outlook continues to assume only modest initial contribution from non-automotive programs as we exit FY26, with the larger opportunity remaining primarily a fiscal 2027 and beyond growth driver. Turning to the fourth quarter, with respect to the sequential progression, there are two dynamics to keep in mind.

First, our third quarter results included $12.5 million of fixed license revenue, and, consistent with the timing-driven nature of these arrangements, we are not contemplating any fixed license revenue in the fourth quarter. Second, we expect normal seasonality, with production volumes often stepping down a bit from the third quarter to the fourth. Together, this means we expect fourth quarter revenue to be lower on a sequential basis. For the fourth quarter, we expect revenue between $61 and $65 million, gross margin between 72% and 75%, expected EBITDA between $1 and $5 million, net income in the range of $1 to $5 million, and diluted EPS between $0.02 and $0.10. I want to be clear that this guidance reflects the timing of fixed license revenue and ordinary seasonal patterns, not a change we see in the health of the underlying business. Excluding the fixed license revenue recognized in Q3, the midpoint of our fourth quarter revenue outlook is higher than our underlying Q3 revenue level. Our per-unit economics have remained intact, our recurring connected services revenue—up 20% year over year—has continued to grow, and our design win momentum is expected to support future volume.

A couple of further notes on the fourth quarter. First, because the fourth quarter does not carry the high-margin contribution from fixed licenses, we expect gross margin to normalize below the 76% we reported in the third quarter. Second, as we discussed previously, the Samsung IP license resulted in an unusually high tax expense earlier in the year, particularly in the first quarter. The expected fourth quarter benefit is incorporated into our Q4 and full-year outlook.

Taken together with our year-to-date results, this Q4 outlook is contemplated within the full-year guidance I'll walk through next and reflects the same disciplined execution delivered through the first three quarters of the year. For the full fiscal year, we now expect revenue of $310 million to $314 million, gross margin of 78% to 79%, GAAP profitability in the range of net loss of $1.1 million to net income of $2.9 million, diluted EPS of a loss of $0.02 to an income of $0.06, adjusted EBITDA of $66 to $70 million, and free cash flow of $76 to $82 million, an increase from our prior outlook of $66 to $76 million.

In closing, we delivered solid execution this third quarter, with growth in total revenue, gross margin ahead of guidance, continued strength in our recurring connected services, and year-over-year profitability growth. As we look to the remainder of fiscal 2026, we remain focused on disciplined execution, strong cash flow generation, and maintaining the financial flexibility to support long-term profitable growth. On our next call, we expect to provide our initial fiscal 2027 guidance and an update on our strategic priorities.

With that, I'll turn it back to Brian.

Stefan Ortmanns, Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Tony. In closing, we're proud of our performance as we approach the end of fiscal 2026. We believe that our results reflect strong execution, solid cash generation, and continued customer momentum together with a disciplined approach to capital allocation. We believe the underlying trajectory of the business remains strong. Connected Services continues to be our extended growth engine. The economics of our recent business have been attractive, and the XUI and agent programs discussed today are expected to position us well for growth as they scale.

The story of fiscal 2026 has been one of execution. We believe that the story of fiscal 2027 will be one of growth powered by the foundation we've built, the customer commitments we've delivered, and the opportunities we see ahead. With XUI and outside of automotive, we remain confident in our strategy and execution, and we're excited about the path ahead. And with that, we'll open up the line for questions.

OPERATOR (Operator)

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from the line of Mark Delaney with Goldman Sachs. Your line is now open.

Mark Delaney, Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Yes, good afternoon. Thank you very much for taking the questions. Congratulations on the XUI win with Stellantis. I'm hoping to better understand the financial implications of the XUI backlog, including the recent win, and now I think you have six in total. Understood the comments around that taking time to ramp up, but maybe you can help investors to better understand what those existing wins will mean for the business for both revenue and profits when they do fully ramp and how long that may take to occur.

Stefan Ortmanns, Chief Executive Officer

I can start, this is Brian, and then Tony can jump in probably with some of the more high-level detail of the finances. But, you know, we said there's about 100,000 vehicles on the road right now with XUI, and that's really pretty good considering really start of production was just a little over a month ago. So, you know, for me the ramp is off and going. We have several more OEMs that should do start of production, say at the end of Q4, beginning of Q1.

You know, we don't actually control exactly when, and there's a lot of, you know, partners that have to come together to deliver the on-time launch. But, you know, so I really think that number is going to go up significantly as we go into Q1, Q2, Q3, fiscal 27. So, you know, if I looked at 27 in total, I think you should see, you know, a couple million cars on the road with XUI versus, you know, the 100,000 that we have today. Financially what that'll mean is we get paid the same way we do with the prior products, where we get the license fee when the car is shipped from the factory and then the connected fee over the life of the connection.

And what we're seeing is these licenses for connected vehicles are actually going longer. We said in the past that our average was like three-ish years. The average of the XUI deals would be more, close to seven years. So we're seeing much longer times for those. So for 27, XUI and Connected will be the growth engines in automotive for us. We haven't forecasted 27, so I expect it to still be relatively minimum, you know, as they ramp up in Q4. But as we go into 27, it will fuel the growth.

Along with Connected, all the XUI models are connected, so it kind of has a double whammy. You get paid more for XUI and they're all connected. We haven't given an exact price for what the XUI deals are, the price per unit, but it is significantly higher than the current price per unit that we quote in our earnings calls for our current products. But we haven't given an exact number for that, and part of that's because it varies depending on the features that everybody chooses and some of that.

But all of them are significantly higher than what we're quoting today.

UNKNOWN, Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, just to summarize that, I think it's exactly right. The impact of XUI is that it's a growth driver both to revenue and to profitability. But it does take time to ramp the old programs down, ramp the new programs up. But it will result in higher PPU over time as those ramp up and, with the higher PPU, creates the operating levers that we've talked about. Brian and I have always talked about that. Our goal is to have a growing business that's increasingly profitable, and we've shown that over the last, probably, you know, eight quarters now that we've been together.

So yeah, this will, you know, XUI means, you know, again, revenue growth and increasing profitability growth.

Mark Delaney, Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Very helpful context. My other question was about the revenue trajectory into next year. Very much recognize your comments around needing to wait for next quarter for the quantitative guidance. I do think last call the company suggested that revenue next year could grow high single to low double digits. If you could speak a little bit qualitatively on how you think about the top-line trajectory into 2027, if you have any early thoughts there, and any key puts and takes.

Thank you.

Stefan Ortmanns, Chief Executive Officer

Sure. I can start again, and Tony, again, can give you kind of a breakdown with a little more financial detail. But again, we tried to give you a little bit of a grounding this quarter by giving you, hey, there's 100,000 XUI vehicles on the road, and I expect non-auto to be $7 to $9 million. That kind of gives you the baseline from this year for where we're at. Right. By the time Q4 ends, expect the XUI number to be significantly higher than that 100,000.

Right. And we'll probably give you the number again at the end of the year just to again kind of set the baseline. If I look into 27, yeah, I think overall you'll see us in the high single to low double digits overall growth. But again, what I think you'll see is strong growth in Connected because the XUI vehicles will be the driver of a lot of those connected vehicles. You'll see strong growth in PPU as XUI continues to grow more into the product base.

And then we plan on having significant growth in the non-automotive space for next year. We haven't given you the forecast for that, but you can think of it as my expectation is non-automotive will grow faster as a percentage than the automotive space for next year. And so you put those together and that's how you get to that. Well, it should be high single digits to low double digits, but then, you know, it's going to be increasingly better as we go through the year.

I expect it's going to be growing much faster as we exit 27 because more and more of it will be connected and more and more of it will be non-automotive. So it'll be a nice steady ramp as we go through that year. We haven't given the numbers yet. I'd love to give you what we're thinking right now, but I'm held to my forecast process. But yeah, that's what's going to drive and fuel the growth.

UNKNOWN, Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, and a couple caveats of course. When we talked about those growth rates that we see in our core business, it was for the technology growth. Again, I think we've said before that professional services, as they become more efficient, will decrease as a percentage in the mix. We still think there's a strong base in professional services, but certainly we don't believe that that's growing. We think that's kind of a base and that it's important to the business, but it lowers as a percentage of the mix.

And as Brian mentioned, the non-automotive will kind of be the growth, the real growth from a percentage standpoint, growth engine in the future, albeit at a smaller base out of the blocks.

Stefan Ortmanns, Chief Executive Officer

And then just remember, none of those forecasts include anything about IP monetization. And we've said that we have currently efforts going with Sony, TCL, Apple, and Amazon in that space. And we don't forecast those because we don't really, we can't absolutely predict the schedules. And so if I miss by a month because of court dates or whatever, I need to be careful. So those would all be on top of that. We have a couple of those that are due to go to the court before the end of this year and then some more into next year.

So I see that as on top of everything else we've talked about from our core technology.

Mark Delaney, Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Thank you. I'll pass it on.

OPERATOR (Operator)

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Itay Michaeli with TD Cowen. Your line is now open.

Justin, Analyst at TD Cowen (for Itay Michaeli)

Hey, great. This is Justin on for Itay. How's everyone doing? So, couple quick questions. Tony, maybe the first one for you. Appreciate you highlighting the Q4 seasonality. Anything outside of normal seasonality that you might be seeing, at least in current production schedules, volatilities that may be hitting kind of Q4 on the licensing side, or have things been relatively stable? Obviously the second-half production environment's a little bit more volatile at this point, so just trying to get a better understanding of what you might be seeing there.

UNKNOWN, Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, I think we kind of highlighted that a little bit in the call. So, you know, again, from a volume standpoint, Q3 over Q3 a year ago, I think we saw some volume declines primarily because, again, there were some volume ramp-ups in Q3 a year ago given the tariff positions. But as we think about Q3 to Q4, I don't see really any movement off of kind of those volumes, other than potentially we've looked back in history and there is oftentimes a slight decrease in our Q4 timeframe with regard to volumes, but not anything really material that we're seeing.

But you've got to remember that ours is, again, a volume business on the variable license side. So we think about the broader market and our specific piece of the broader market. Volume is always important, but I don't see anything really changing much from Q3 to Q4.

Justin, Analyst at TD Cowen (for Itay Michaeli)

Perfect. Appreciate the color there. And then, Brian, maybe a couple for you: maybe any update that you could share on the BYD XUI launch—how are things progressing, what's going on there? And then maybe double-clicking a little bit on that Stellantis win, what are the key parameters and benchmarks that you were comped against and maybe how the competitive environment was within that business quote.

Stefan Ortmanns, Chief Executive Officer

Sure. So, you know, when we said 100,000 vehicles on the road, BYD is a part of that and there's another OEM that is a part of that as well. So there's more than one OEM in that 100,000. You know, what happens is they ramp these things by geography and by language and sometimes by model, especially in some of the larger OEMs where they have maybe 10 different models of vehicle, they'll launch them kind of sequentially. From a BYD perspective, though, it's going well.

We're continuing to add more geographies and more languages. We're up to 20, we said, now. And so we add them as they require based on their production ramp. And the feedback's been really good. The feedback's been very positive on XUI from an end-user standpoint and just the production capability of being able to build a vehicle and develop the software into the vehicle. So for us, we think the ramp's going quite well.

Justin, Analyst at TD Cowen (for Itay Michaeli)

Very helpful. Appreciate it.

OPERATOR (Operator)

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question at this time, please press star 11 on your touchtone telephone. Our next question comes from the line of Jeff Van Rhee with Craig-Hallum Capital Group. Your line is now open.

Daniel, Analyst at Craig-Hallum Capital Group (for Jeff Van Rhee)

Hey, Brian, Tony, this is Daniel on for Jeff. Maybe, if you want, characterize how the typical sales cycle for XUI looks like—how long are these conversations, what's the competition like? Maybe you could use Stellantis as an example, but typical XUI sales cycle, you—

Brian Krzanich, Chief Executive Officer

You know, boy, the sales cycles, they're not short. You typically, you know, it starts with the OEM producing an RFQ. And oftentimes, especially if we are already involved with that OEM, we help them generate what the RFQ should look like as far as what kind of features they want to look for and, you know, what's the technology out there capable of. So that starts the process. From there, you usually have to come in with a proposal that includes what the technology is, what your hardware requirements are.

What we often do is bring in vehicles that are actually running the technology and bring them. For example, we went into one large OEM back in the spring with the vehicles to their headquarters and brought their whole board of directors to the meeting to sit in the vehicle and actually see what was capable. And then you start kind of getting into the pricing and features and timing, and oftentimes what's really important is the amount of support you're willing to give.

Because the integration of this software, it's not a simple download like you do on your phone or your PC. There's a great deal of integration with the OEM, the Tier 1 hardware providers, other software providers that you all have to do to get to that point, and it's the amount of support you're willing to give. So we oftentimes have engineers sitting in the OEM to really help develop the product. That all takes probably on average six months at least.

I've got some that are going well beyond that now, because then you're kind of waiting for their process. From a competitive standpoint, what usually happens is kind of like everybody shows up at the beginning and they usually narrow it down to one or two, usually two of us at the end, and then it's kind of a runoff. What's interesting to me is it's not been a price war. It hasn't been, you know, well, we need another dollar out of this or something like that.

It's really been more about features and support. You know, can you support all of the interconnects they want, the connections to other third-party products that they're trying to do to personalize the vehicle, and then the amount of support you'll give in launching the vehicle and getting this thing to production. That's really been more what's kind of a debate at the end. And then, yeah, there's a little bit of price. I'm not going to say there's nothing, but we haven't gotten to a point where we think it's a race to the bottom.

Like I said, the prices we're getting right now are quite a bit higher than what we currently quote for our PPU.

UNKNOWN, Analyst

Great. And that's helpful. And then on Q4 and just what's implied as I look at it in our model, I think the Q4 uptick, Xfix license, it looks like it sort of implies a rebound in variable license and pro forma royalties. Maybe something like a 10% jump in variable pro forma. Just your thoughts on Q4. What's your visibility? Are you expecting a rebound in unit volume sort of in end customers or maybe in percentage of cars shipped with? Just what are you thinking to get you to that Q4 number?

Brian Krzanich, Chief Executive Officer

We always have pretty good insight into the numbers and, you know, we're already a little bit into the fourth quarter. Right. So we have some insight into this number set. And what you're really just seeing, like Tony said, was we see kind of a return to the typical seasonal Q4 output numbers from production vehicles. We're seeing more and more Connected. We saw 20% year-over-year growth in the third quarter in Connected. You know, we're going to see similar kinds of growth in the fourth quarter for Connected as well.

So, you know, we just continue to see our kind of, we're back to seasonality, we're back to a normal Q4, and, you know, we're seeing more and more Connected, and that kind of gets us to our Q4 number. Tony, if there's anything.

Tony Rodriguez, Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, the only other thing I would add is we think about some of our non-automotive areas. We see some activity of that that really won't get into specifically in the details, but there's some non-automotive increase in the number as well.

UNKNOWN, Analyst

Okay, that's helpful. Thanks guys.

OPERATOR (Operator)

Thank you. And I'm currently showing no further questions at this time. I'd now like to hand the call back over to Brian Kurzanich for closing remark.

Brian Krzanich, Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, I just would like to say thank you, everybody, for coming to our third quarter earnings call. We really look forward to our fourth quarter where we can present our 2027 roadmap and forecast. We're excited for the work we're already doing lining up to that. Like we said, it's the year of growth for 2027 where XUI really helps fuel that growth. The connected vehicles percentage will continue to increase as we said, and then it's going to be a year where we will see more and more of the non-automotive space growth, and we expect that space to grow at a rate much faster than the automotive portion of our business as well.

So we look forward to seeing you in December for the fourth quarter results and our forecast into '27. Thank you for joining, and I'd just like to thank the whole Cerence team for a great quarter. Really great execution and great results. And with that, I'll say good evening.

OPERATOR (Operator)

This concludes today's conference. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

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