UPDATED 18:34 EDT / JULY 27 2016

NEWS

Facebook’s Q2 earnings skyrocket thanks to massive growth in ad revenue

Facebook continues its quest for world domination, and after looking at its latest Q2 earnings results, the social media giant may be well on its way. According to Facebook’s second quarter numbers, the company’s gross revenue has increased by a staggering 59 percent year-over-year, reaching over $6.44 billion primarily thanks to advertising revenue, which itself increased by over 63 percent.

These figures are significantly higher than those predicted by Wall Street analysts, who expected Facebook to post earnings of around $6.02 billion. As a result, Facebook’s shares jumped by over 6 percent in after-hours trading.

Company founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that Facebook’s user base has also continued to grow, and the platform now boasts over 1.7 billion monthly active users. To put that into perspective, that accounts for  roughly 23 percent of the entire world population. David Wehner, Vice President, Corporate Finance and Business Planning, added that Facebook’s user growth is higher than it has been in three years.

Image courtesy of Facebook

“We’re going to become video-first”

During the earnings call, Zuckerberg once again referenced Facebook’s three, five and ten year plan, which he laid out during the company’s recent annual shareholder’s meeting. In the near-to-mid term, this includes a heavy focus on video content, which Zuckerberg says will continue to be an increasingly important medium on the web.

“We’re going to become video-first,” Zuckerberg said during today’s earnings call. ” … We really believe that in five years, most of what people consume online is going to be video. That means that there needs to be a whole range of new production tools and consumption experiences for that.”

Zuckerberg highlighted live video as a particularly important part of Facebook’s plans, and company COO Sheryl Sandberg noted that Facebook has several deals in the works with content creators to stream premium live content, including several events at the upcoming 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Jenairo, Brazil. Sandberg added that Facebook’s primary focus at the moment is in short-form video content, saying that the company is “excited to see what type of content people create.”

Facebook’s next growth area: developing countries

Facebook Aquila drone

With a user base that is quickly approaching 2 billion monthly active users, Facebook could soon reach full saturation, meaning that the only way it can grow is by getting more people online.

That is exactly what Facebook is trying to do through its Connectivity Lab projects, which are aimed at developing technologies that can bring internet access to the more than 4 billion people who live without it. During the earnings call, Zuckerberg noted the recent successful test flight of Facebook’s Aquila drone, a solar-powered aircraft designed to fly for up to three months continuously while beaming internet access to the ground.

This may sound like science fiction, but last year, Connectivity Labs announced that it had successfully managed to use lasers to transfer data at 10s of gigabits-per-second at a target more than 10 miles away. When combined with Aquila, this would allow internet access to be delivered to regions that are too remote or too dangerous to build land-based infrastructure.

“We’re still early in our journey with lots of hard work ahead,” Zuckerberg admitted, “but we’re making progress.”

Images courtesy of Facebook

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