Twilio (TWLO) UBS’s 2025 Global Technology and AI Conference summary

Market trends and drivers

• Voice technology is experiencing renewed growth, driven by advancements in AI, speech recognition, and generative voice models, alongside the rise of large language models (LLMs).

• AI is enabling the shift of voice applications from cloud-based models to local, real-time business-consumer interactions, especially for SMBs and enterprises.

• Voice remains a natural and efficient communication channel, particularly in sectors like healthcare, retail, and financial services, where customer calls are frequent and costly.

• Enterprises are in early stages of adopting Voice AI, with many testing and gradually ramping up deployments, especially in regulated industries.

• Voice AI is becoming a more significant contributor to revenue growth, though traditional voice use cases still dominate.

Product evolution and differentiation

• The platform offers programmable APIs with advanced features such as call recording, transcription, routing, and integration with AI agents for sentiment and keyword analysis.

• Conversation Relay and Conversational Intelligence are modular software layers that handle speech recognition, analysis, and actionable insights, supporting multiple providers and secure data handling.

• The infrastructure is designed for flexibility, allowing customers to mix and match components and avoid vendor lock-in, supporting rapid innovation and adaptation.

• Integration across channels (voice, SMS, email) enables seamless conversational AI experiences, with orchestration capabilities that differentiate the offering.

• The company’s developer-friendly APIs and global connectivity attract both startups and large enterprises seeking scalable, reliable solutions.

Go-to-market strategy and financial impact

• ISVs and enterprises are key channels, with a focus on enabling rapid deployment for SMBs and leveraging self-service APIs for new Voice AI startups.

• Sales incentives emphasize cross-sell and multi-product adoption, driving balanced growth across messaging, email, and voice.

• Voice represents 12% of 2024 revenue, with recent acceleration to mid-teens growth rates, the highest in three years.

• Voice AI deals offer significant upsell opportunities, with software components like Conversation Relay priced at a premium per minute, boosting average deal size and gross margins.

• The ROI for customers is compelling, as automation reduces costs from dollars per call (human agents) to pennies per call (AI-enabled), while improving consumer outcomes.