Item 1A. Risk Factors.
The following descriptions of risk factors includes any material changes to, and supersedes the description of risk factors associated with, the Company’s business previously disclosed in Part I, Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended April 28, 2017 filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) (the “2017 Form 10-K”) under the heading “Risk Factors.” Our business, financial condition and operating results can be affected by a number of factors, whether currently known or unknown, including but not limited to those described below, any one or more of which could, directly or indirectly cause our actual results of operations and financial condition to vary materially from the past, or from anticipated future, results of operations and financial condition. Any of these factors, in whole or in part, could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and common stock price.
The following discussion of risk factors contains forward-looking statements. These risk factors may be important to understanding any statement in this Form 10-Q or elsewhere. The following information should be read in conjunction with the condensed consolidated financial statements and the related notes in Part I, Item 1 – Financial Statements and Part I, Item 2 – Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations of this Form 10-Q.
The following discussion reflects our current judgment regarding the most significant risks we face. These risks can and will change in the future.
Our business may be harmed by trends in the networked storage hardware market or if we are unable to keep pace with rapid industry, technological and market changes.
Our industry and the markets in which we compete have historically experienced significant growth due to the increase in the demand for storage and data management solutions by consumers, enterprises and government bodies around the world, and the resultant purchases of storage and data management solutions to address this demand. However, despite continued data growth, the networked storage hardware market experienced a decline in each of the last two calendar years due to a combination of customers delaying purchases in the face of technology transitions, increasing adoption of Cloud environments built on commodity hardware, increased storage efficiency, and changing economic and business environments. While customers are navigating through their IT transformations, which leverage modern architectures and hybrid cloud environments, they are also reducing IT budgets, looking for simpler solutions, and rethinking how they consume IT. This evolution is diverting spending towards transformational projects and architectures like flash, hybrid cloud, IT as a service, converged infrastructure, and software defined storage. Our business may be adversely impacted if we are unable to keep pace with rapid industry, technological or market changes or if our Data Fabric strategy is not accepted in the marketplace. As a result of these and other factors discussed in the report, our revenue may grow at a slower rate than in past periods, or may decline as it did in fiscal years 2015, 2016 and 2017, on a year-over year basis. The future impact of these trends on both short-term and long-term growth patterns is uncertain. If the general historical rate of industry growth declines, if the growth rates of the specific markets in which we compete decline, and/or if the consumption model of storage changes and our new and existing products, services and solutions do not receive customer acceptance, our business, operating results and financial condition could suffer.
If we are unable to develop, introduce and gain market acceptance for new products while managing the transition from older products, or if we cannot provide the expected level of quality, service and support for our new products, our business, operating results and financial condition could be harmed.
Our future growth depends upon the successful development and introduction of new hardware and software products and related services. Due to the complexity of storage software, subsystems and appliances and the difficulty in gauging the engineering effort required to produce new products, such products are subject to significant technical and quality control risks.
If we are unable, for technological, customer reluctance or other reasons, to develop, introduce and gain market acceptance for new products, as and when required by the market and our customers, our business, operating results and financial condition could be materially and adversely affected.
New or additional product introductions, including new software and flash product offerings, such as ONTAP Cloud, all flash FAS, AltaVault, and SolidFire, subject us to additional financial and operational risks, including our ability to forecast customer preferences and/or demand, our ability to successfully manage the transition from older products and solutions, our ability to forecast the impact of customers’ demand for new products and solutions or the products being replaced, and our ability to manage production capacity to meet the demand for new products. In addition, as new or enhanced products are introduced, we must also avoid excessive levels of
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older product inventories and related components and en
sure that enough supplies of new products can be delivered to meet customers’ demands. Further risks inherent in new product and solutions introductions include the uncertainty of price-performance relative to products of competitors, competitors’ response
s to the introductions, delays in sales caused by the desire of customers to evaluate new products for extended periods of time and our partners’ investment in selling our new products and solutions. If these risks are not managed effectively, we could exp
erience material risks to our operations, financial condition and business model.
As we enter new or emerging markets, we will likely increase demands on our service and support operations and may be exposed to additional competition. We may not be able to provide products, service and support to effectively compete for these market opportunities.
Our new consumption based business models may adversely affect our revenues and profitability.
We offer customers a full range of consumption models, including the deployment of our software through our subscription and cloud-based SaaS, and utility pricing and managed services offerings for our hardware and software systems. These business models continue to evolve, and we may not be able to compete effectively, generate significant revenues or maintain the profitability of our consumption based offerings. Additionally, the increasing prevalence of cloud and SaaS delivery models offered by us and our competitors may unfavorably impact the pricing of our on-premise hardware and software offerings and could have a dampening impact on overall demand for our on-premise hardware and software product and service offerings, which could reduce our revenues and profitability, at least in the near term. If we do not successfully execute our consumption model strategy or anticipate the needs of our customers, our revenues and profitability could decline.
As customer demand for our consumption model offerings increases, we could experience volatility in our reported revenues and operating results due to the differences in timing of revenue recognition between our hardware arrangements and software licenses, (that are generally recognized in full at the time of delivery), relative to our consumption model offering arrangements, (t
hat are generally recognized ratably over the terms of the arrangement). We incur certain expenses associated with the infrastructure and marketing of our consumption model offerings in advance of our ability to recognize the revenues associated with these offerings.
Our sales and distribution structure makes forecasting revenues difficult and, if disrupted, could harm our operating results.
Our business and sales models make revenues difficult to forecast. We sell to a variety of customers, with a corresponding variety of sales cycles. In addition, the majority of our sales are made and/or fulfilled indirectly through channel partners, including value-added resellers, systems integrators, distributors, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and strategic business partners. This structure significantly complicates our ability to forecast future revenue, especially within any particular fiscal quarter or year. Moreover, our relationships with our indirect channel partners are critical to our success. The loss of one or more of our key indirect channel partners in a given geographic area or the failure of our channel partners to promote our products could harm our operating results, as qualifying and developing new indirect channel partners typically require a significant investment of time and resources before acceptable levels of productivity are met. If we fail to maintain our relationships with our indirect channel partners, if their financial condition, business or customer relationships were to weaken, if they fail to comply with legal or regulatory requirements, or if we were to cease to do business with them for these or other reasons, our business, operating results and financial condition could be harmed.
Increasing competition and industry consolidation could harm our business and operating results.
The storage and data management markets are intensely competitive and are characterized by rapidly changing technology and fragmentation. We compete with many companies in the markets we serve, including established public companies, newly public companies with a strong flash focus, and new market entrants addressing the growing opportunity for hyper-converged systems. Some offer a broad spectrum of IT products and services (full-stack vendors) and others offer a more limited set of storage and data management products or services. Technology trends, such as the emergence of hosted or public cloud storage, SaaS and flash storage are driving significant changes in storage architectures and solution requirements. Cloud service providers provide customers storage as an operating expense, rather than as a capital expenditure, for the customers’ data centers, which meets rapidly evolving business needs and has changed the competitive landscape.
Competitors may develop new technologies or products in advance of us or establish business models or technologies disruptive to us. By extending our flash, converged infrastructure and cloud storage offerings, we are competing in new segments with both traditional competitors and new competitors, particularly smaller emerging storage vendors. The longer-term potential and competitiveness of these emerging vendors remains to be determined. In cloud and converged infrastructure, we also compete with large well-established competitors.
For additional information regarding our competitors, see the section entitled “Competition” contained in Item 1 – Business of Part I of our fiscal 2017 Form 10-K. It is possible that new competitors or alliances among competitors might emerge and rapidly acquire significant market share or buying power. An increase in industry consolidation might result in stronger competitors that are better able to compete as full stack vendors for customers and achieve increased economies of scale in the supply chain. For example, in October 2016, Dell Inc. and EMC Corp. consummated their agreement to merge. Also in April 2017, HP Enterprise completed their
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acquisition of Nimble Storage. In addition, current and potential competitors have established or might est
ablish cooperative relationships among themselves or with third parties, including some of our partners or suppliers.
Continuing uncertain economic and political conditions restrict our visibility and may harm our operating results, including our revenue growth and profitability.
The continuing global economic uncertainty, political conditions and fiscal challenges in the United States (U.S.) and abroad have, among other things, limited our ability to forecast future demand for our products, contributed to increased periodic volatility in the computer, storage and networking industries at large, as well as the information technology (IT) market, and could constrain future access to capital for our suppliers, customers and partners. The impacts of these circumstances are global and pervasive, and the timing and nature of any ultimate resolution of these matters remain highly uncertain. Consequently, we expect these concerns to challenge our business for the foreseeable future, which could cause harm to our operating results. Such conditions have resulted, and may in the future again result, in failure to meet our forecasted financial expectations and to achieve historical levels of revenue growth.
Our quarterly operating results may fluctuate materially, which could harm our common stock price.
Our operating results have fluctuated in the past and will continue to do so, sometimes materially. All of the matters discussed in this Risk Factors section could impact our operating results in any fiscal quarter or year. In addition to those matters, we face the following issues, which could impact our quarterly results:
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Seasonality, such as our historical seasonal decline in revenues in the first quarter of our fiscal year and seasonal increase in revenues in the second quarter of our fiscal year, with the latter due in part to the impact of the U.S. federal government’s September 30 fiscal year end on the timing of its orders; and
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Linearity, such as our historical intra-quarter bookings and revenue pattern in which a disproportionate percentage of each quarter’s total bookings and related revenue occur in the last month of the quarter.
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If our operating results fall below our forecasts and the expectations of public market analysts and investors, the trading price of our common stock may decline.
Our gross margins vary.
Our gross margins reflect a variety of factors, including competitive pricing, component and product design, the volume and relative mix of product, software maintenance, hardware maintenance and other services revenues. Increased component costs, increased pricing and discounting pressures, the relative and varying rates of increases or decreases in component costs and product prices, changes in product, software maintenance, hardware maintenance and other services revenue mix or decreased volume could harm our revenues, gross margins or earnings. Our gross margins are also impacted by the cost of any materials that are of poor quality and our sales and distribution activities, including, without limitation, pricing actions, rebates, sales initiatives and discount levels, and the timing of service contract renewals.
The costs of third-party components comprise a significant portion of our product costs. While we generally have been able to manage our component and product design costs, we may have difficulty managing these costs if supplies of certain components become limited or component prices increase. Any such limitation could result in an increase in our product costs. An increase in component or design costs relative to our product prices could harm our gross margins and earnings.
We often incur expenses before we receive related benefits, and expenses may be difficult to reduce quickly if demand declines.
We base our expense levels in part on future revenue expectations and a significant percentage of our expenses is fixed. It is difficult to reduce our fixed costs quickly, and if revenue levels are below our expectations, operating results could be adversely impacted. During periods of uneven growth or decline, we may incur costs before we realize the anticipated related benefits, which could also harm our operating results. We have made, and will continue to make, significant investments in engineering, sales, service and support, marketing and other functions to support and grow our business. We are likely to recognize the costs associated with these investments earlier than some of the related anticipated benefits, such as revenue growth, and the return on these investments may be lower, or may develop more slowly, than we expect, which could harm our business, operating results and financial condition.
If we are unable to maintain and develop relationships with strategic partners, our revenues may be harmed.
Our growth strategy includes developing and maintaining strategic partnerships with major third-party software and hardware vendors to integrate our products into their products and also co-market our products with them. A number of these strategic partners are industry leaders that offer us expanded access to segments of the storage and data management markets. However, there is intense competition for attractive strategic partners, and these relationships may not be exclusive, may not generate significant revenues and may be terminated on short notice. For instance, some of our partners are also partnering with our competitors, which may increase the availability of competing solutions and harm our ability to grow our relationships with those partners. Moreover, some of our partners,
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particu
larly large, more diversified technology companies, are also competitors, complicating our relationships. If we are unable to establish new partnerships or maintain existing partnerships, if our strategic partners favor their relationships with other vendo
rs in the storage industry or if our strategic partners increasingly compete with us, we could experience lower than expected revenues, suffer delays in product development, or experience other harm to our business, operating results and financial conditio
n.
If we do not achieve forecasted bookings in any quarter, our financial results could be harmed.
We derive a majority of our revenues in any given quarter from orders booked in the same quarter. Bookings typically follow intra-quarter seasonality patterns weighted toward the back end of the quarter. If we do not achieve the level, timing and mix of bookings consistent with our quarterly targets and historical patterns, or if we experience cancellations of significant orders, our financial results could be harmed.
A portion of our revenues is generated by large, recurring purchases from various customers, resellers and distributors. A loss, cancellation or delay in purchases by any of these parties has negatively affected us in the past, and in the future could, negatively affect our revenues.
A significant portion of our net revenues are generated through sales to a limited number of distributors. We generally do not enter into binding purchase commitments with our customers, resellers and distributors for extended periods of time, and thus we may not be able to continue to receive large, recurring orders from these customers, resellers or distributors. For example, our reseller agreements generally do not require minimum purchases, and our customers, resellers and distributors can stop purchasing and marketing our products at any time. In addition, unfavorable economic conditions may negatively impact the solvency of our customers, resellers and distributors or the ability of such customers, resellers and distributors to obtain credit to finance purchases of our products. If any of our key customers, resellers or distributors changes its pricing practices, reduces the size or frequency of its orders for our products, or stops purchasing our products altogether, our operating results and financial condition could be materially adversely impacted.
We rely on a limited number of suppliers for critical product components.
We rely on a limited number of suppliers for drives and other components utilized in the assembly of our products, including certain single source suppliers, which has subjected us, and could in the future subject us to, price rigidity, periodic supply constraints, and the inability to produce our products with the quality and in the quantities demanded. Consolidation among suppliers, particularly within the semiconductor and disk drive industries, has contributed to price rigidity and may in the future create supply constraints. When industry supply is constrained, our suppliers may allocate volumes away from us and to our competitors, all of which rely on many of the same suppliers as we do. Accordingly, our operating results may be harmed.
Any disruption to our supply chain could materially harm our business, operating results and financial condition.
We do not manufacture our products or their components. Instead, we rely on third parties to make our products and critical components, such as disk drives, as well as for associated logistics. Our lack of direct responsibility for, and control over, these elements of our business, as well as the diverse international geographic locations of our manufacturing partners and suppliers, creates significant risks for us, including, among other things:
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Limited ability to control the quality, quantity and cost of our products or of their components;
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The potential for binding price or purchase commitments with our suppliers that are higher than market rates;
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Limited ability to adjust production volumes in response to our customers’ demand fluctuations;
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Labor and political unrest at facilities we do not operate or own;
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Geopolitical disputes disrupting our supply chain;
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Business, legal compliance, litigation and financial concerns affecting our suppliers or their ability to manufacture and ship our products in the quantities, quality and manner we require; and
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Disruptions due to floods, earthquakes, storms and other natural disasters, particularly in countries with limited infrastructure and disaster recovery resources.
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Such risks have in the past and could again in the future subject us to supply constraints, price increases and minimum purchase requirements and our business, operating results and financial condition could be harmed. The risks associated with our out-sourced manufacturing model are particularly acute when we transition products to new facilities or manufacturers, introduce and increase volumes of new products or qualify new contract manufacturers or suppliers, at which times our ability to manage the relationships among us, our manufacturing partners and our component suppliers, becomes critical. New manufacturers, products, components or
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facilities create increased costs and risk that we will fail to deliver high quality products in the required volumes to our customers. Any failure
of a manufacturer or component supplier to meet our quality, quantity or delivery requirements in a cost-effective manner will harm our business, operating results and customer relationships.
Due to the global nature of our business, risks inherent in our international operations could materially harm our business.
A significant portion of our operations is located, and a significant portion of our revenues is derived, outside of the U.S. In addition, most of our products are manufactured outside of the U.S., and we have research and development, sales and service centers overseas. Accordingly, our business and our future operating results could be adversely impacted by factors affecting our international operations including, among other things, local political or economic conditions, trade protection and export and import requirements, tariffs, local labor conditions, transportation costs, government spending patterns, acts of terrorism, international conflicts and natural disasters in areas with limited infrastructure. In addition, due to the global nature of our business, we are subject to complex legal and regulatory requirements in the U.S. and the foreign jurisdictions in which we operate and sell our products, including antitrust and anti-competition laws, rules and regulations, and regulations related to data privacy. We are also subject to the potential loss of proprietary information due to piracy, misappropriation, or laws that may be less protective of our intellectual property rights than U.S. laws. Such factors could have an adverse impact on our business, operating results and financial condition.
We face exposure to adverse movements in foreign currency exchange rates as a result of our international operations. These exposures may change over time as business practices evolve, and they could have a material adverse impact on our financial results and cash flows. We utilize forward and option contracts in an attempt to reduce the adverse earnings impact from the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on certain assets and liabilities as well as certain anticipated foreign currency cash flows on a short-term basis. Our hedging strategies may not be successful, and currency exchange rate fluctuations could have a material adverse effect on our operating results. In addition, our foreign currency exposure on assets and liabilities for which we do not hedge could have a material impact on our operating results in periods when the U.S. dollar significantly fluctuates in relation to unhedged non-U.S. currencies in which we transact business.
Additional risks inherent in our international business activities generally include, among others, longer accounts receivable payment cycles and difficulties in managing international operations.
Moreover, in many foreign countries, particularly in those with developing economies, it is common to engage in business practices that are prohibited by our internal policies and procedures, or U.S. laws and regulations applicable to us, such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. There can be no assurance that all our employees, contractors and agents, as well as those companies to which we outsource certain of our business operations, will comply with these policies, procedures, laws and/or regulations. Any such violation could subject us to fines and other penalties, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition.
We could be subject to additional income tax liabilities.
Our effective tax rate is influenced by a variety of factors, many of which are outside of our control. These factors include among other things, fluctuations in our earnings and financial results in the various countries and states in which we do business, the outcome of income tax audits and changes to the tax laws in such jurisdictions. Changes to any of these factors could materially impact our operating results.
We receive significant tax benefits from sales to our non-U.S. customers. These benefits are contingent upon existing tax laws and regulations in the U.S. and in the countries in which our international operations are located. Future changes in domestic or international tax laws and regulations or a change in how we manage our international operations could adversely affect our ability to continue realizing these tax benefits.
Many countries around the world are beginning to implement legislation and other guidance to align their international tax rules with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation’s Base Erosion and Profit Shifting recommendations and related action plans that aim to standardize and modernize global corporate tax policy, including changes to cross-border tax, transfer-pricing documentation rules and nexus-based tax incentive practices. As a result, many of these changes, if enacted, could increase our worldwide effective tax rate and harm our financial position and results of operations.
We are routinely subject to income tax audits in the U.S. and several foreign tax jurisdictions. If the ultimate determination of income taxes or at-source withholding taxes assessed under these audits results in amounts in excess of the tax provision we have recorded or reserved for, our operating results, cash flows and financial condition could be adversely affected.
Our effective tax rate could also be adversely affected by different and evolving interpretations of existing law or regulations, which in turn would negatively impact our operating and financial results as a whole. Additionally, our effective tax rate could also be adversely affected if there is a change in international operations, our tax structure and how our operations are managed and structured, and as a result, we could experience harm to our operating results and financial condition. The recent U.S. tax law changes enacted through the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act are subject to further interpretations from the U.S. federal and state governments and regulatory organizations, such as the Treasury Department and/or IRS. Changes to interpretations of the law could change the provisional tax
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expense
or accounting treatment
of the $7
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million expense we have recorded in relation to the transition tax.
We have elected to pay the transition tax
over a period of eight years. As result, our cash flows from operating activities will be
adversely impacted until the additional tax provisions are paid in full.
Our success depends upon our ability to effectively plan and manage our resources and restructure our business in response to changing market conditions and market demand for our products, and such actions may have an adverse effect on our financial and operating results.
Our ability to successfully offer our products and services in a rapidly evolving market requires an effective planning, forecasting, and management process to enable us to effectively scale and adjust our business in response to fluctuating market opportunities and conditions.
In response to changes in market conditions and market demand for our products, we have in the past undertaken cost savings initiatives. For example, in May 2015, March 2016 and November 2016, we executed restructuring events designed to streamline our business, reduce our cost structure and focus our resources on key strategic opportunities. As a result, we have recognized substantial restructuring charges. We may in the future undertake initiatives that may include restructuring, disposing of, and/or otherwise discontinuing certain products, or a combination of these actions. Rapid changes in the size, alignment or organization of our workforce, including sales account coverage, could adversely affect our ability to develop, sell and deliver products and services as planned or impair our ability to realize our current or future business and financial objectives. Any decision to take these actions may result in charges to earnings associated with, among other things, inventory or other fixed, intangible or goodwill asset reductions (including, without limitation, impairment charges), workforce and facility reductions and penalties and claims from third party resellers or users of discontinued products. Charges associated with these activities would harm our operating results. In addition to the costs associated with these activities, we may not realize any of the anticipated benefits of the underlying restructuring activities.
If our products are defective, or are perceived to be defective as a result of improper use or maintenance, our gross margins, operating results and customer relationships may be harmed.
Our hardware and software products are complex. We have experienced in the past, and expect to experience in the future, quality issues. Quality risk is most acute when we are introducing new products. Quality issues have and could again in the future cause customers to experience outages or disruptions in service, data loss or data corruption. If we fail to remedy a product defect, we may experience a failure of a product line, temporary or permanent withdrawal from a product or market, damage to our reputation, loss of revenue, inventory costs or product reengineering expenses and higher ongoing warranty and service costs, and these occurrences could have a material impact on our gross margins, business and operating results. In addition, we exercise little control over how our customers use or maintain our products, and in some cases improper usage or maintenance could impair the performance of our products, which could lead to a perception of a quality issue. Customers and we may experience losses that may result from or are alleged to result from defects in our products, which could subject us to claims for damages, including consequential damages.
If a data center or other third-party who relies on our products experiences a disruption in service or a loss of data, such disruption could be attributed to the quality of our products, thereby causing financial or reputational harm to our business.
Our clients, including data centers, SaaS, cloud computing and Internet infrastructure and bandwidth providers, rely on our products for their data storage needs. Our clients may authorize third-party technology providers to access their data on our systems. Because we do not control the transmissions between our clients, their customers, and third-party technology providers, or the processing of such data by third-party technology providers, we cannot ensure the complete integrity or security of such transmissions or processing. Errors or wrongdoing by clients, their customers, or third-party technology providers resulting in security breaches may be attributed to us.
A failure or inability to meet our clients’ expectations with respect to security and confidentiality through a disruption in the services provided by these third-party vendors, or the loss of data stored by such vendors, could result in financial or reputational harm to our business to the extent that such disruption or loss is caused by, or perceived by our customers to have been caused by, defects in our products. Moreover, the risk of reputational harm may be magnified and/or distorted through the rapid dissemination of information over the Internet, including through news articles, blogs, chat rooms, and social media sites. This may affect our ability to retain clients and attract new business.
If a cybersecurity or other security breach occurs on our systems or on our end user customer systems, or if stored data is improperly accessed, customers may reduce or cease using our solutions, our reputation may be harmed and we may incur significant liabilities.
We store and transmit sensitive and proprietary data related to our products, our employees, customers, clients and partners (including third-party vendors such as data centers and providers of SaaS, cloud computing, and Internet infrastructure and bandwidth), and their respective customers, including intellectual property, books of record and personally identifiable information. It is critical to our business strategy that our infrastructure remains secure and is perceived by customers, clients and partners to be secure. There are numerous and evolving risks to cybersecurity and privacy, including criminal hackers, state-sponsored intrusions, industrial espionage,
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human error and technological vulnerabilities. Cybersecurity incidents or other security breaches could result in (1) unauthor
ized access to, or loss or unauthorized disclosure of, such information; (2) litigation, indemnity obligations, government investigations and other possible liabilities; (3) negative publicity; and (4) disruptions to our internal and external operations. A
ny of these could damage our reputation and public perception of the security and reliability of our products, as well as harm our business and cause us to incur significant liabilities. In addition, a cybersecurity incident or other security breach could
result in other negative consequences, including remediation costs, disruption of internal operations, increased cybersecurity protection costs and lost revenues.
Our clients and customers use our platforms for the transmission and storage of sensitive data. We do not monitor or review the information or content that our clients and their customers upload and store, and, therefore, we have no direct control over the substance of the information or content stored within our platforms. If our employees, or our clients, partners or their respective customers use our platforms for the transmission or storage of personally identifiable or other sensitive information and our security measures are breached as a result of third-party action, employee error, malfeasance, stolen or fraudulently obtained log-in credentials or otherwise, our reputation could be damaged, our business may be harmed and we could incur significant liabilities.
High-profile cyber-attacks and security breaches have increased in recent years, and security industry experts and government officials have warned about the risks of hackers and cyberattacks targeting information technology products and businesses. Because techniques used to obtain unauthorized access or to sabotage systems change frequently and often are not recognized until launched against a target, we may be unable to anticipate these techniques or to implement adequate preventative measures. As we continue to increase our client base and expand our brand, we may become more of a target for third parties seeking to compromise our security systems and we anticipate that hacking attempts and cyberattacks will increase in the future. We cannot give assurance that we will always be successful in preventing or repelling unauthorized access to our systems.
Many jurisdictions have enacted or are enacting laws requiring companies to notify individuals of data security breaches involving certain types of personal data. These mandatory disclosures regarding security breaches often lead to widespread negative publicity. Moreover, the risk of reputational harm may be magnified and/or distorted through the rapid dissemination of information over the Internet, including through news articles, blogs, chat rooms, and social media sites. Any security breach, whether actual or perceived, could harm our reputation, erode customer confidence in the effectiveness of our data security measures, negatively impact our ability to attract new customers, cause existing customers to elect not to renew their support contracts, or subject us to third-party lawsuits, regulatory fines or other action or liability, which could materially and adversely affect our business and operating results. In particular, our SaaS business could be subject to stricter obligations and greater fines under the impending enactment of the new European Data Protection Regulation on May 25, 2018.
There can be no assurance that the limitations of liability in our contracts would be enforceable or adequate or would otherwise protect us from any such liabilities or damages with respect to any particular claim. Our existing general liability insurance coverage and coverage for errors and omissions may not continue to be available on acceptable terms or may not be available in sufficient amounts to cover one or more large claims, or our insurers may deny coverage as to any future claim. The successful assertion of one or more large claims against us that exceeds available insurance coverage, or the occurrence of changes in our insurance policies, including premium increases or the imposition of large deductible or co-insurance requirements, could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition.
If we are unable to attract and retain qualified personnel, our business, operating results and financial condition could be harmed.
Our continued success depends, in part, on our ability to hire and retain qualified personnel and to preserve the key aspects of our corporate culture. Because our future success is dependent on our ability to continue to enhance and introduce new products, we are particularly dependent on our ability to hire and retain qualified engineers. In addition, to increase revenues, we will be required to increase the productivity of our sales force and support infrastructure to achieve adequate customer coverage. Competition for qualified employees, particularly in Silicon Valley, is intense. We have periodically reduced our workforce, including an 11% reduction announced in March 2016 and a 6% reduction announced in November 2016, and these actions may make it more difficult to attract and retain qualified employees. Our inability to hire and retain qualified management and skilled personnel, particularly engineers, salespeople and key executive management, could be disruptive to our development efforts, sales results, business relationships and/or our ability to execute our business plan and strategy on a timely basis and could materially and adversely affect our operating results.
Equity grants are a critical component of our current compensation programs. If we reduce, modify or eliminate our equity programs, we may have difficulty attracting and retaining critical employees.
In addition, because of the structure of our cash and equity incen
tive compensation plans, we may be at increased risk of losing employees at certain times. For example, the retention value of our compensation plans decreases after the payment of annual bonuses or the vesting of equity awards.
We are continually seeking ways to make our cost structure, business processes and systems more efficient, including by moving activities from higher-cost to lower-cost locations, outsourcing certain business processes and functions, and implementing new
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business information systems
. Problems with the execution of these activities could have an adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition. In addition, we may not achieve the expected benefits of these initiatives.
We continuously seek to make our cost structure and business processes more efficient, including by moving our business activities from higher-cost to lower-cost locations, outsourcing certain business processes and functions, and implementing changes to our business information systems. These efforts involve a significant investment of financial and human resources and significant changes to our current operating processes. In addition, as we move operations into lower-cost jurisdictions and outsource certain business processes, we become subject to new regulatory regimes and lose control of certain aspects of our operations and, as a consequence, become more dependent upon the systems and business processes of third-parties. If we are unable to move our operations, outsource business processes and implement new business information systems in a manner that complies with local law and maintains adequate standards, controls and procedures, the quality of our products and services may suffer and we may be subject to increased litigation risk, either of which could have an adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition. Additionally, we may not achieve the expected benefits of these and other transformational initiatives, which could harm our business, operating results and financial condition.
Our acquisitions may not achieve expected benefits, and may increase our liabilities, disrupt our existing business and harm our operating results.
As part of our strategy, we seek to acquire other businesses and technologies to complement our current products, expand the breadth of our markets, or enhance our technical capabilities. For example, in February 2016, we acquired SolidFire, Inc., and in fiscal 2015 we acquired the SteelStore product line (renamed AltaVault) from Riverbed Technology, Inc. The benefits we expect to receive from these and other acquisitions depend on our ability to successfully conduct due diligence, negotiate the terms of the acquisition and integrate the acquired business into our systems, procedures and organizational structure. Any inaccuracy in our acquisition assumptions or any failure to uncover liabilities or risks associated with the acquisition, make the acquisition on favorable terms, integrate the acquired business or assets as and when expected or retain key employees of the acquired company may reduce or eliminate the expected benefits of the acquisition to us, increase our costs, disrupt our operations, result in additional liabilities, investigations and litigation, and may also harm our strategy, our business and our operating results. The failure to achieve expected acquisition benefits may also result in impairment charges for goodwill and purchased intangible assets.
Reduced U.S. government demand could materially harm our business and operating results. In addition, we could be harmed by claims that we have or a channel partner has failed to comply with regulatory and contractual requirements applicable to sales to the U.S. government.
The U.S. government is an important customer for us. However, government demand is uncertain, as it is subject to political and budgetary fluctuations and constraints. Events such as the U.S. federal government shutdown in October 2013 and continued uncertainty regarding the U.S. budget and debt levels, have increased demand uncertainty for our products, and in our fiscal 2016 resulted in lower sales to these customers. In addition, like other customers, the U.S. government may evaluate competing products and delay purchasing in the face of the technology transitions taking place in the storage industry. If the U.S. government or an individual agency or multiple agencies within the U.S. government continue to reduce or shift their IT spending patterns, our revenues and operating results may be harmed.
Selling our products to the U.S. government, whether directly or through channel partners, also subjects us to certain regulatory and contractual requirements. Failure to comply with these requirements by either us or our channel partners could subject us to investigations, fines, and other penalties, which could materially harm our operating results and financial condition. As an example, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and the General Services Administration (GSA) have in the past pursued claims against and financial settlements with IT vendors, including us and several of our competitors and channel partners, under the False Claims Act and other statutes related to pricing and discount practices and compliance with certain provisions of GSA contracts for sales to the federal government. Although the DOJ and GSA currently have no claims pending against us, we could face claims in the future. Violations of certain regulatory and contractual requirements could also result in us being suspended or debarred from future government contracting. Any of these outcomes could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition.
We are exposed to credit risks and fluctuations in the market values of our investment portfolio.
We maintain an investment portfolio of various holdings, types, and maturities. Credit ratings and pricing of our investments can be negatively affected by liquidity, credit deterioration, financial results, economic risk, political risk, sovereign risk or other factors. As a result, the value and liquidity of our investments may fluctuate substantially. Therefore, although we have not recently realized any significant losses on our investments, future fluctuations in their value could result in a significant realized loss.
There are risks associated with our outstanding and future indebtedness.
As of January 26, 2018, we had $1.6 billion aggregate principal amount of outstanding indebtedness for our senior notes that mature at specific dates in calendar years 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2024, and we had an aggregate of $632 million of commercial paper
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notes outstanding with maturities ranging from
17
to
46
days. We may incur additional indebtedness in the future under existing credit facilities and/or entering
into new financing arrangements. We may fail to pay these or additional future obligations, as and when required. Specifically, if we are unable to generate sufficient cash flows from operations or to borrow sufficient funds in the future to service or ref
inance our debt, our business, operating results and financial condition will be harmed. Any downgrades from credit rating agencies such as Moody’s Investors Service or Standard & Poor’s Rating Services may adversely impact our ability to obtain additional
financing or the terms of such financing and reduce the market capacity for our commercial paper. Furthermore, if prevailing interest rates or other factors result in higher interest upon any potential future financing, then interest expense related to th
e refinance indebtedness would increase.
In addition, all our debt and credit facility arrangements subject us to continued compliance with restrictive and financial covenants. If we do not comply with these covenants or otherwise default under the arrangements, we may be required to repay any outstanding amounts borrowed under these agreements. Moreover, compliance with these covenants may restrict our strategic or operational flexibility in the future, which could harm our business, operating results and financial condition.
We are exposed to the credit and non-payment risk of our customers, resellers and distributors, especially during times of economic uncertainty and tight credit markets, which could result in material losses.
Most of our sales to customers are on an open credit basis, with typical payment terms of 30 days. We may experience losses due to a customer’s inability to pay. Beyond our open credit arrangements, some of our customers have entered into recourse and non-recourse financing leasing arrangements using third-party leasing companies. Under the terms of recourse leases, which are generally three years or less, we remain liable for the aggregate unpaid remaining lease payments to the third-party leasing companies in the event of end-user customer default. During periods of economic uncertainty, our exposure to credit risks from our customers increases. In addition, our exposure to credit risks of our customers may increase further if our customers and their customers or their lease financing sources are adversely affected by global economic conditions.
Our failure to adjust to emerging standards in the storage and data management industry may harm our business.
Emerging standards in the storage and data management markets may adversely affect the UNIX
®
, Windows
®
and the World Wide Web server markets upon which we depend. For example, we provide our open access data retention solutions to customers within the financial services, healthcare, pharmaceutical and government market segments, industries that are subject to various evolving governmental regulations with respect to data access, reliability and permanence in the U.S. and in the other countries in which we operate. If our products do not meet and continue to comply with these evolving governmental regulations in this regard, customers in these market and geographical segments will not purchase our products, and we may not be able to expand our product offerings in these market and geographical segments at the rates which we have forecasted.
Some of our products are subject to U.S. export control laws and other laws affecting the countries in which our products and services may be sold, distributed, or delivered; any violation of these laws could have a material and adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition.
Due to the global nature of our business, we are subject to import and export restrictions and regulations, including the Export Administration Regulations administered by the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) and the trade and economic sanctions regulations administered by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). The U.S., through the BIS and OFAC, places restrictions on the sale or export of certain products and services to certain countries and persons. Violators of these export control and sanctions laws may be subject to significant penalties, which may include significant monetary fines, criminal proceedings against them and their officers and employees, a denial of export privileges, and suspension or debarment from selling products to the federal government. Our products could be shipped to those targets by third parties, including potentially our channel partners, despite our precautions.
If we were ever found to have violated U.S. export control laws, we may be subject to various penalties available under the laws, any of which could have a material and adverse impact on our business, operating results and financial condition. Even if we were not found to have violated such laws, the political and media scrutiny surrounding any governmental investigation of us could cause us significant expense and reputational harm. Such collateral consequences could have a material adverse impact on our business, operating results and financial condition.
Changes in regulations relating to our products or their components, or the manufacture, sourcing, distribution or use thereof, may harm our business and operating results.
The laws and regulations governing the manufacturing, sourcing, distribution and use of our products have become more complex and stringent over time. For example, in addition to various environmental laws relating to carbon emissions and the use and discharge of hazardous materials, the SEC adopted regulations concerning the supply of certain minerals originating from the conflict zones of the Democratic Republic of Congo or adjoining countries. We incur costs to comply with the disclosure requirements of this law and may realize other costs relating to the sourcing and availability of minerals used in our products. Further, since our supply chain is complex, we may face reputational harm if our customers or other stakeholders conclude that we are unable to verify sufficiently the
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origins of the
minerals used in the products we sell. As the laws and regulations governing our products continue to expand and change, our costs are likely to rise, and the failure to comply with any such laws and regulations could subject us to business interruptions,
litigation risks and reputational harm.
Our failure to protect our intellectual property could harm our business, operating results and financial condition.
Our success depends significantly upon developing, maintaining and protecting our proprietary technology. We rely on a combination of patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, confidentiality procedures and contractual provisions with employees, resellers, strategic partners and customers, to protect our proprietary rights. We currently have multiple U.S. and international patent applications pending and multiple U.S. and international patents issued. The pending applications may not be approved, and our existing and future patents may be challenged. If such challenges are brought, the patents may be invalidated. We may not be able to develop proprietary products or technologies that are patentable, and patents issued to us may not provide us with any competitive advantages and may be challenged by third parties. Further, the patents of others may materially and adversely affect our ability to do business. In addition, a failure to obtain and defend our trademark registrations may impede our marketing and branding efforts and competitive condition. Litigation may be necessary to protect our proprietary technology. Any such litigation may be time-consuming and costly. Despite our efforts to protect our proprietary rights, unauthorized parties may attempt to copy aspects of our products or obtain and use information that we regard as proprietary. In addition, the laws of some foreign countries do not protect proprietary rights to as great an extent as do the laws of the U.S. Our means of protecting our proprietary rights may not be adequate or our competitors may independently develop similar technology, duplicate our products, or design around patents issued to us or other intellectual property rights of ours.
We are subject to intellectual property infringement claims that arise in the normal course of business. We may, from time to time, receive claims that we are infringing third parties’ intellectual property rights, including claims for alleged patent infringement brought by non-practicing entities. We are involved in patent litigations brought by non-practicing entities.
We believe we have strong arguments that our products do not infringe and/or the asserted patents are invalid, and we intend to vigorously defend against the plaintiffs’ claims. However, there is no guarantee that we will prevail at trial and if a jury were to find that our products infringe, we could be required to pay significant monetary damages, and may cause product shipment delays, require us to redesign our products, or require us to enter into royalty or licensing agreements
.
Third parties may in the future claim infringement by us with respect to current or future products, patents, trademarks or other proprietary rights. We expect that companies in the network storage and data management markets will increasingly be subject to infringement claims as the number of products and competitors in our industry segment grows and the functionality of products in different industry segments overlaps. Any such claims, and any such infringement claims discussed above, could be time consuming, result in costly litigation, cause product shipment delays, require us to redesign our products, or require us to enter into royalty or licensing agreements, any of which could materially and adversely affect our operating results. Such royalty or licensing agreements, if required, may not be available on terms acceptable to us or at all.
Our business could be materially and adversely affected as a result of natural disasters, terrorist acts or other catastrophic events.
We depend on the ability of our personnel, inventories, equipment and products to move reasonably unimpeded around the world. Any political, military, terrorism, global trade, world health or other issue that hinders this movement or restricts the import or export of materials could lead to significant business disruptions. Furthermore, any economic failure or other material disruption caused by natural disasters, including fires, floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, and volcanoes; power loss or shortages; environmental disasters; telecommunications or business information systems failures or break-ins and similar events could also adversely affect our ability to conduct business. If such disruptions result in cancellations of customer orders or contribute to a general decrease in economic activity or corporate spending on IT, or directly impact our marketing, manufacturing, financial and logistics functions, or impair our ability to meet our customer demands, our operating results and financial condition could be materially adversely affected. In addition, our headquarters is located in Northern California, an area susceptible to earthquakes. If any significant disaster were to occur, our ability to operate our business and our financial condition could be impaired.
Changes in financial accounting standards may cause adverse unexpected fluctuations and affect our reported operating results.
A change in accounting standards or practices and varying interpretations of existing accounting pronouncements, the increased use of fair value measures, changes to revenue recognition, lease accounting, financial instruments and other accounting standards could have a significant effect on our reported financial results or the way we conduct our business. Implementation of accounting regulations and related interpretations and policies, particularly those related to revenue recognition, could cause us to defer recognition of revenue or recognize lower revenue, which may affect our operating results.
Our stock price is subject to volatility.
Our stock price is subject to changes in recommendations or earnings estimates by financial analysts, changes in investors' or analysts' valuation measures for our stock, changes in our capital structure, including issuance of additional debt, changes in our credit
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ratings, our ability to pay dividends and to cont
inue to execute our stock repurchase program as planned and market trends unrelated to our performance.
Our ability to pay quarterly dividends and to continue to execute our stock repurchase program as planned will be subject to, among other things, our financial condition and operating results, available cash and cash flows in the U.S., capital requirements, and other factors. Future dividends are subject to declaration by our Board of Directors, and our stock repurchase program does not obligate us to acquire any specific number of shares. If we fail to meet any expectations related to dividends and/or stock repurchases, the market price of our stock could decline significantly, and could have a material adverse impact on investor confidence. Additionally, price volatility of our stock over a given period may cause the average price at which we repurchase our own stock to exceed the stock’s market price at a given point in time.
Furthermore, speculation in the press or investment community about our strategic position, financial condition, results of operations or business can cause changes in our stock price. These factors, as well as general economic and political conditions and the timing of announcements in the public market regarding new products or services, product enhancements or technological advances by our competitors or us, and any announcements by us of acquisitions, major transactions, or management changes may adversely affect our stock price.