Blackbird (BIRD) H1 2026 earnings summary

Executive summary

• elevate.io subscriber growth accelerated after marketing restarted in mid-July; management cited coordinated product improvements, pricing changes and focused marketing.

• Focus shifted toward in-house corporate marketing teams, with product enhancements and data-driven marketing supporting growth.

• Blackbird platform served high-profile events, including the global winter games, contributing non-recurring revenue.

Financial highlights

• H1 2026 revenue was £0.53m, down 8% year-over-year after key deal losses, partly offset by event-driven revenue.

• Contracted but unrecognised revenue fell 31% year-over-year to £1.04m, partly due to technology licensing renewal timing.

• Operating costs decreased to £1.43m from £1.61m; EBITDA loss narrowed to £0.99m from £1.15m and net loss to £1.50m from £1.56m.

• Cash burn excluding transfers declined 14% to £1.29m; period-end cash and short-term investments were £1.90m, with no debt.

• Blackbird platform revenue was £512k; elevate.io revenue was £19k in H1.

Outlook and guidance

• Blackbird division expected to maintain positive EBITDA in H2 and for full-year 2026.

• Management expects continued elevate.io growth from increased marketing and product-market fit among corporate teams.

• Q4 priorities include remarketing free users, rebuilding YouTube as a demand-generation channel, expanding organic discovery and testing paid channels.

• Product work includes GPU-accelerated text and graphics, animation, integrations and AI-assisted editing; prompt-generated graphics are not an immediate release.

• Directors are confident in financial resources into 2027 while continuing to explore funding opportunities.