cory: shares of linkedin heading higher. ♪ cory: i'm cory johnson, this is bloomberg west. that the videogame company continues with news of a blockbuster new franchise. silicon valley was not the only

game in town of self driving cars, general motors is ready to make it a race. first, linkedin shares jumping after hours after a strong quarter. they reported revenue of $780 million. revenues for the year, saying they will taken $2.98 million on topline earnings, fueled by stronger demand. james, when you look at these numbers, i feel like i don't pay enough attention to this company because it does so well so often. guest: essentially, what we saw tos quarter was then able move past a lot of the challenges we saw during the first half of the year during the salesforce reorganization. on top of that, the accounting issues. they were firing across all

cylinders. they expanded relationships. on top of that, the sponsored updates, which is their mobile advertising. putting that together, it was an encouraging quarter. that salesforce reorganization was interesting because it didn't seem like they were having a lot of issues. that hejust decided needs a cleaner grasp on what is going on. guest: yeah, i would say, it wasn't -- it is something that they have done every year. the issue was the magnitude of the reorganization they did. the issues they had were not on retention, but the ability to upsell products. you are putting your sales in front of new customers. it illuminated their ability to expand. they strengthened those

relationships, got more comfortable with each other, the customer account is now around $40,000 and growing nicely, now the enterprisee as well. it seems a lot of the issues -- they have moved past them successfully. cory: sequential growth of users, pretty good. they said in a press release they were already at 400 million. , 400: the number rates .illion, compared to facebook clearly, they are doing something right. one thing to keep in mind, this is not a one trick pony. you had recruitment and advertising. on top of that, you had the ability to get in front of sellers. this is something that i think will be on the desk of every

salesperson in the world because social selling will be increasingly and to the sales process. make to the sale -- process.o the sales about theirtalk main business, getting companies to use it linkedin. it is really growing. the company is 10 years old. a group 46% year-over-year. salesforceut the reorganization working? guest: it is partly attributable to that, because you are segmenting salesforce into different types of accounts. smaller, faster growing, slower growing and getting the right people in front of the right accounts to drive greater wallet share.

.ow, you have lynda.com that has not been talked about that much, it is something due to them and they paid a lot of money for it. it caused a lot of accounting hiccups. as you think about hr function and automating a lot of the things that hr has to do, on top of that, putting those products in front of professionals to boost, that is something that can become a new growth lever in its own right. talk about marketing solutions. this is a business that publishes stuff, people go to linkedin to read things and it is maybe important with people using it more often, 20% year-over-year growth in publishing, i have for it for a long time, if you were to the magazine you would kill to see that growth, what are these guys getting right the most media companies are not? guest: in one word, native advertising.

their sponsored update projects. think about your newsfeed within linkedin. these are advertisements that look like content and that is incredibly engaging and very much conducive to mobile. that segment is half the revenue at that point. the reason it is not growing faster is because you are seeing the headwinds on the display side. displays havektop fallen. it is only 15% of their business now. as you see mobile eclipse that along with their new product which changes the whole b2b segmentg, that is a although impressive, can it maintain? cory: really quick, i want to ask you about messaging. you had a intriguing comment about linkedin, china to get us

to think of them not as a jobsite but as a message inside. right what they are doing now is changing the way you interact with each other on linkedin, new messaging tools, new collaboration tools. think about the companies that are successful in social right now, are the ones that really optimize for communication. you can see that with facebook and you are seeing it with linkedin. as you think about the future of linkedin, it is increased communication and collaboration in publishing as a destination allreading things that are things this and is related for whatever interests you may have. so that is really what i mean about the messaging and collaboration aspect that i think is underappreciated. cory: fantastic. great to see you. good stuff.

blood tests and continues to make headlines and fight off skeptics. the new york times reporting --heranos --ow t theranos restructured their board of directors. schultz [indiscernible] two advisory board of counselors . they have created a medical board for additional advice. a board of directors, board of counselors, and a medical board. interesting stuff. coming up, he a gets a boost from -- ea gets a boost from thief and mad -- ea gets a boost from fifa and madden. project loon lands next year in

indonesia, next. ♪

cory: sports games. usersd monthly average for madden and fifa up 30%.

those monster games could get some company. a new star wars battlefront game are hitting the stores in november. they could sell 13 million copies. shares are down a little bit after hours. ,oining us now to discuss ea the founder of digital world research. when you build a business, when you look at the world of games, is ea the company where you want to be? >> yeah, they have. incredible on the gaming space here not only through console games but mobile development. they are the one of the top five publishers in mobile and in regular gaming. cory: fantastic. we have been talking about this company for 15 years. they went through a fallow period but the stock went up

215% in two years. it seems like they have fixed a lot of things. what stands out the most? >> of the sports titles are alive and well and they are driving online usage, which has been a bugaboo for them. with the advent of the these guys 4, and are clearly riding the coattails. when you stand inside of the ceo's office, there is a giant screen, i giant monitor not showing a game but all the statistics about what is happening on online games, wait times for customer service, and it lets in see this in real time with a cool info graphic. is that focus on customer experience winning? shirt.

they really had to get that right. it had been a problem for them for several years. they have gotten it right input a keen focus on it. beta did not have that many problems, they had tons of people playing it, and it is a great experience for them to use it during the game launch. back -- let to get me stay with you on star wars. weretar wars numbers really incredible in terms of people trying the beta of just a tiny part of that game. i wonder beyond that, what does that tell you about sales? >> there is no question that this is one of the largest ip in the history of entertainment. there have been 10 million people who have watched the advertisement campaign with the guy jumping out of the office building on youtube. they raised the numbers to 13

million and that is still probably conservative. 4's, you cans take in a ratio of 15 million and upward. cory: there was criticism a couple of years back that ea was not doing enough in mobile and online. they recategorized results to make those numbers look a little bit bigger. when you look at these guys and what they are doing, what their -- what are they good at? >> they have been really incredible -- they have a lot of titles apathy have an incredible job monetizing that. they have been able to constantly create great titles that people love. you see companies like zynga that have faltered a bit over the past couple of years. game when it comes to

play, how are they doing? you don't need fancy graphics to make a game good. tetris proves that, candy crash. like in gameplay, it must be working. i feel like they do have great graphics but also the user experience of the game and a lot of loyal users, you can see in their sporting franchises, every time they dden it a new fifa or ma always goes to the top of the charts and they have a loyal fan base him on the titles that they have. want to change here and talk about what is going on with nintendo. what is going on? there is discussion about a mobile app expected today being pushed off again. >> if you look at nintendo historically, it is not the

right experience they want to have. have 32 games that tanked because of the gaming experience. thes not much verizon history of doing this and it sets up for a calendar in 2016 with mobile games in 2017 to be that much better and to have a partnership with [indiscernible] , have more time to be fully baked before they have time to show games. cory: and not really a company that is known for doing a lot of partnerships, too. >> yeah. i definitely agree with that. one thing i would point out, a lot of people in the industry were confused on why they didn't go with the mario franchises. i would like to see than pushing for mobile next year for what they are really known for. cory: i have to ask you one last question, over your left shoulder, is that vinyl? like lots of vinyl? >> that is lots of vinyl. the analog world is still alive and well in some pockets of

america. cory: i thought you were a digital guy. it is digital world research that he has vinyl. thank you very much, both eu. bet,loping story, alpha google chrome will fold -- they're growing dominance of mobile computing and represents the unification between two software platforms his dividing lines have been blurred. google announced plans last month to run a tablet running android with a tablet also doubles as a laptop. he planted dated the you the new operating system in 2017. staying with alphabet, getting ready to blow up balloons. project balloon is alphabet's plan to give the world access to the internet via balloons in the

stratosphere. the president of the project will get its test next year in indonesia. currently, one in three people are connected to the internet in indonesia. up, tightening the race for self driving cars, next. ♪

cory: american automakers have been trimming about self trayvon

cars since the days of franklin delano roosevelt the lately, silicon valley looks like it is close to making a treatment reality. google and tesla has been leaving detroit in the dust. we take a closer look at what general motors will do to tighten the race. keith, first of all, terrific story. i encourage everybody to check it out. seeset a sense that gm itself as an innovator, a company that knows how to build cars better than anyone. are trying to live in both worlds, showing that they are veterans and experts are car building. as i interviewed mark royce, he times.e word disrupt 14 he is trying to speak the language of the valley. cory: that sounds a retaining, actually. irritating,ds actually. are certainly in a

race with google and tesla and apple. what they are trying to do is be an innovator in driverless cars when the share at the moment is with google. cory: google -- i was down there a couple months ago and they took the presentation secretary around and gave him a ride in a self driving car. what is it about google that makes them seem like they are in the lead? guest: when google talks about what it is doing, it describes it as a moon shot. the cars they are showing, it has no steering wheel or pedal. they are going the full monty. they don't want drivers at all. whereas, gm wants to do incremental improvements, one step at a time to get us to autonomy. that is the contrast.

two very different models. the top of your story gets a that, quoting the gm guy saying, i like driving cars. i interviewed the ceo of maclaren at the pebble beach car show. to do, are you ever going a self driving car? he just laughed. two carmakers fundamentally believe that anybody will actually want a self driving car? guest: mark royce, who loves to drive and race cars, believes that eventually we will have mostly a car sharing economy and that we will be driven and that cars will be for hobbyists. for a race car drivers on the weekend. they do see the change coming. if gm sticks with their model, they will be out of business. he wants you business with google rather than against them.

beta releaseas a is something they are calling, self driving-ish. there are some scary videos that show people using it in ways they were not supposed to. it makes me think of the ethical issues for the builder which is, you have to assume that your users are not always going to be smart, they will do dumb things. self driving automobiles, does that leave room for dumb users? is it better? guest: the ultimate would be if the user was not involved at all, that is google's point p robots will drive more perfectly than human beings. .hat will reduce road deaths carmakers, like the tesla autopilot, still requires you to have hands on the wheel. gm lets you take your hands off the wheel. and he with mark royce

put his hands on his lap, and off we went. that requires a higher level of sensors and technology. and face high scanners scanners to make sure you are still looking at the road so they can tell you to come back and he will be ready. there are other things about decisions that cars make that take it out of human hands. you have a terrific story that it's the cover of bloomberg businessweek today. i encourage everybody to check it out. [indiscernible] would realize more cost savings and projected from its acquisition of orbits. the travel website saw as much as 18% in after-hours trading. that does it for this edition of bloomberg west. we will see you back here tomorrow. ♪

>> from our studios in new york city, this is "charlie rose." welcome to the program. earlier tonight, the republican presidential candidates squared colorado, for their third debate. we tape this, the debate is just beginning. we will have full analysis and tomorrow.ve >> you have to be patient and stick with it and all of that. also, i can't fake anger. i believe this is still the most extraordinary country on the face of the earth and it troubles me people are rewarded tearing down our country. it's never been that way in american politics before. by saying that i'm not sure it's a