TTWOTake-Two Interactive Software, Inc.
AI adoption · Q1 2026 earnings call
Communication ServicesPiloting
10
extracted from this call
4 / 5
quantified with specifics
Not disclosed
no breakout in this call
AI was discussed substantively on this call primarily in response to analyst questions, with CEO Strauss Zelnick providing the most detailed commentary. Management framed AI as a tool for operational efficiency and creative enablement rather than a transformative threat, citing a concrete example of AI-generated marketing content that reduced production costs to near zero. CFO Lainie Goldstein briefly referenced AI as part of the company's broader effort to generate operational efficiencies and improve margins. No AI-specific revenue attribution or dedicated AI investment figures were disclosed.
Adopter
See full leaderboard →44/ 100
53
stage: piloting · max spec: 4
40
1 quant outcome
35
1 scope
internal_use
10 AI mentions from this call.
Extracted verbatim from the TTWO Q1 2026 earnings call transcript. Speaker, section, and specificity tier surfaced for each mention.
- T4Q&A· CEO· Internal usejust given this remains a pretty big debate among investors, I thought it would be helpful to hear your latest views just around what you're seeing in AI and how you expect it to change the gaming industry in Take-Two in particular.
“I was visiting one of our studios, and they showed me some advertisements that they were putting together to advertise their games. And these were live action ads, and they were funny and cute, 15- to 30-second ad units that you've seen a zillion times. And they were all created with AI, licensed AI, legal AI. And the script was done in-house for free, well, by people, colleagues or company already. And the software was used, AI software was used. The entire cost of making this spot was 0. And previously, we hired third-party companies to actually create those with human beings, and those spots could cost $25,000, $50,000, $100,000.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings call - T3Q&A· CEO· Internal usejust given this remains a pretty big debate among investors, I thought it would be helpful to hear your latest views just around what you're seeing in AI and how you expect it to change the gaming industry in Take-Two in particular.
“not only were we not interested in reducing our headcount to make this happen, we didn't have the opportunity to reduce our headcount to make this happen. The entire marketing team at this particular studio is two people. They're doing a great job. But what AI has allowed them to do is be more efficient, make great stuff and do it cheaper. And this is all a benefit to our company.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings call - T3Q&A· CEO· Internal useWith respect to mobile advertising and building additional optimization around user acquisition, how are you thinking about the signals as more mobile advertising becomes driven by AI and machine learning with respect to either being able to deploy more dollars at a higher return on ad spend or possibly becoming more efficient with respect to advertising?
“we are constantly on a daily basis, tuning up our models that will inform how we spend money on user acquisition. As I said, sometimes it's greater, sometimes it's lower.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings callAppLovin - T2Q&A· CEO· Internal useon the last earnings call, Google Genie had just launched in beta. There's been some conversations more recently around the ability for AI to perhaps create GTA VI in a couple of months. I know this is a bit of a generic high-level question you've touched on before, but just given this remains a pretty big debate among investors, I thought it would be helpful to hear your latest views just around what you're seeing in AI and how you expect it to change the gaming industry in Take-Two in particular.
“To the extent that technology allows anyone to do a better job in asset creation, naturally, we'll avail ourselves with the same technology. If you take a look at the tech in-market that is currently licensed for the creation of video games, it's licensed broadly. No one exclusively licensed this technology for video games. So if a competitor has access to AI and that allows someone to do something better, quicker, cheaper, then we would have access to the same thing.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings callGoogle Genie - T2Q&A· CEO· Internal usejust given this remains a pretty big debate among investors, I thought it would be helpful to hear your latest views just around what you're seeing in AI and how you expect it to change the gaming industry in Take-Two in particular.
“asset creation is not the same as hit creation. And the best example of that is there are thousands of new mobile releases a year, but there's a handful of new mobile hits a year, and we make some of them. Despite the fact that everyone has access to the same tech because everyone licenses exactly the same underlying technology for the creation of mobile titles as we do.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings call - T2Q&A· CFO· Internal usecan you just remind us how you're thinking about the ability to return to the historic margin levels that Take-Two used to see?
“as we operate at this new level and generate operational efficiencies through reduction efforts and leveraging new technologies, including AI, we aim to enhance our margin profile over time.”
— Lainie Goldstein, TTWO earnings call - T2Q&A· CEO· Internal useDo you feel like at this point, you've got broad buy-in from your studio leadership around the use of AI tools, not just in marketing, but in game development. And when you think about these tools over time, I know you're doing a lot in terms of investing in product tools related to AI. Do you think this will allow you and your studio teams to unlock maybe some dormant franchise IP or even new IP that may not have been produced over the last decade plus due to resource constraints?
“I think that everyone has bought into the possibilities of new technology. And I think there are times when some of my colleagues think I'm too conservative on the topic.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings call - T1Prepared remarks· CFO· Internal use
“With our focus on incorporating new technologies and tools, we feel confident in our ability to scale our business, generate operational efficiencies and leverage the power of our balance sheet, which we believe will drive long-term shareholder returns.”
— Lainie Goldstein, TTWO earnings call - T1Q&A· CEO· Internal useDo you feel like at this point, you've got broad buy-in from your studio leadership around the use of AI tools, not just in marketing, but in game development.
“Our art is created in computers. It always has been. But our art is created by human beings using computers, and I believe that will continue to be the case.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings call - T1Prepared remarks· CEO· Internal use
“invest in technology that will unlock greater creative capabilities and operational efficiencies across our organization.”
— Strauss Zelnick, TTWO earnings call
What management wouldn’t quantify.
Analyst questions where management declined to share a specific number. The pattern of refusals is often as informative as the disclosures.
- No quantification of AI-related investment or R&D spend despite Zelnick referencing ongoing investment in technology tools.
- No disclosure of how many studios or employees are currently using AI tools in game development workflows.
- CFO referenced 'leveraging new technologies, including AI' as a margin driver but provided no quantification of expected savings or timeline.
- Analyst (Cory Carpenter, JPMorgan) asked about AI's impact on game creation (referencing Google Genie); management responded qualitatively with no forward-looking metrics or deployment specifics.
- Analyst (Michael Hickey, StoneX) asked about AI buy-in across studio leadership and whether AI could unlock dormant IP; management responded philosophically without disclosing specific programs, timelines, or investment levels.
- Analyst (Eric Sheridan, Goldman Sachs) asked about AI/ML-driven mobile advertising optimization; management confirmed use of AppLovin and daily model tuning but declined to quantify ROAS improvements or efficiency gains.
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