Item 1. Business
Company Background
We are a leading global provider of software product development and digital platform engineering services to clients located around the world, primarily in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. With a strong focus on innovative and scalable software solutions and a continually evolving mix of advanced capabilities, we leverage industry standard and custom developed technology, tools and platforms to deliver results for the most complex business challenges. We focus on building long-term partnerships with clients in industries such as financial services, travel and consumer, software and hi-tech, media and entertainment, life sciences and healthcare, as well as other emerging industries.
Our work with global leaders in enterprise software platforms and emerging technology companies has allowed us to develop vertical-specific domain expertise. Our culture of innovation, technology leadership, process excellence and high-quality project delivery has helped us continue to build a strong reputation in the marketplace.
Our historical core competency, software development and product engineering services created our foundation for the evolution of our other offerings, which include advanced technology software solutions, intelligent enterprise services and digital engagement. Our strategic acquisitions have further expanded our global footprint and service offering portfolio, including our capabilities in the healthcare and financial services industries, digital strategy and design, consulting and test automation. We expect our strategic acquisitions will continue to enable us to offer a broader range of services to our clients from a wider variety of locations.
Our Services
Our service offerings cover the full software product development lifecycle from digital strategy and customer experience design to enterprise application platforms implementation and program management services and from complex software development services to maintenance, support, custom application development, application testing, and infrastructure management. We meet the standards of ISAE 3402 Type 2, ISO 27001:2013 and ISO 9001:2015, and these certifications provide our clients with third-party verification of our information security, quality management and general controls practices.
We also work closely with leading companies in other industries to enable our clients to better leverage technology and address the simultaneous pressures of driving value for the consumer and offering a more engaging experience. Our digital strategy and experience design practice provides strategy, design, creative and program management services for clients looking to improve their customer experience. We offer deep expertise across several domains including business-to-business and business-to-consumer e-commerce, customer/partner self-service, employee portals, online merchandising and sales, web content management, mobile solutions and billing.
Our key service offerings include:
Software Product Development Services
We provide a comprehensive set of software product development services including product research, customer experience design and prototyping, program management, component design and integration, full lifecycle software testing, product deployment and end-user customization, performance tuning, product support and maintenance, managed services, as well as porting and cross-platform migration. We focus on software products covering a wide range of business applications as well as product development for multiple mobile platforms and embedded software product services.
Custom Application Development Services
We offer complete custom application development services to meet the requirements of businesses with sophisticated needs not adequately supported by packaged applications or by existing custom solutions. Our custom application development services leverage our experience in software product development as well as our industry expertise, prebuilt application solution frameworks and specific software product assets. Our range of services includes business and technical requirements analysis, user experience design, solution architecture creation and validation, development, component design and integration, quality assurance and testing, deployment, performance tuning, support and maintenance, legacy applications re-engineering/refactoring, porting and cross-platform migration and documentation.
Application Testing Services
We maintain a dedicated group of testing and quality assurance professionals with experience across a wide range of technology platforms and industry verticals. Our Quality Management System complies with global quality standards such as ISO 9001:2015 and we employ industry-recognized and proprietary defect tracking tools to deliver a comprehensive range of testing services. Our application testing services include: (i) software application testing, including test automation tools and frameworks; (ii) testing for enterprise IT, including test management, automation, functional and non-functional testing, as well as defect management; and (iii) consulting services focused on helping clients improve their existing software testing and quality assurance practices.
Application Maintenance and Support
We deliver application maintenance and support services through a dedicated team of IT professionals. Our clients benefit from our proprietary distributed project management processes and tools, which reduce the time and costs related to maintenance, enhancement and support activities. Our services include incident management, fault investigation diagnosis, work-around provision, application bug fixes, release management, application enhancements and third-party maintenance.
Infrastructure Management Services
We offer infrastructure management services to address clients’ increased need for tighter enterprise integration between software development, testing and maintenance with private, public and mobile infrastructures. We have significant expertise in implementing large infrastructure monitoring solutions, providing real-time notification and control from the low-level infrastructure up to and including applications. Our solutions cover the full lifecycle of infrastructure management including application, database, network, server, storage and systems operations management, as well as incident notification and resolution.
Enterprise Information Management
We build enterprise technologies that offer smarter analytics, improve business processes, and result in greater operational excellence. Our global delivery framework and industry-specific blueprints allow us to meet the needs of our clients’ enterprises and build business application platforms and their components in areas including customer relationship management, sales automation, enterprise resource planning, enterprise content management, business intelligence and cloud management. We deploy the platforms and services that enable data-driven business decisions by turning data into intelligence. Our agile engineering expertise allows us to offer services around business process management, enterprise content management and more, including requirements analysis and platform selection, deep and complex customization, cross-platform migration, implementation and integration, as well as support and maintenance. We use our experience, custom tools and specialized knowledge to integrate our clients’ chosen application platforms with their internal systems and processes and to create custom solutions filling the gaps in their platforms’ functionality necessary to address the needs of the clients’ users and customers.
Our Vertical Markets
Strong vertical-specific knowledge, backed by extensive experience merging technology with the business processes of our clients, allows us to deliver tailored solutions to various industry verticals. We have categorized our customers into five main industry verticals and a group of emerging verticals.
Financial Services.
We have significant experience working with global investment banks, firms, and brokerages, commercial and retail banks, credit card companies, wealth management institutions, depositories, corporate treasuries, pension funds, and market data providers. We assist these clients with challenges stemming from new regulations, compliance requirements, customer-based needs and risk management. Our financial services domain experts have been recognized with industry awards for engineering and deploying unique applications and business solutions that facilitate growth, competitiveness, and customer loyalty while driving cost efficiency for global financial institutions.
Travel and Consumer.
Our capabilities span a range of platforms, applications and solutions that businesses in travel and hospitality use to serve their customers, capture management efficiencies, control operating expenses and grow revenues. Some of the world’s leading airlines, hotel providers and travel agencies rely on our knowledge in creating high-quality tools for operating and managing their business. Within this vertical, we also serve global, regional and local retailers, online retail brands, consumer goods manufacturers and distributors and online marketplaces. We deliver a wide range of services to retail and eCommerce clients from complex system modernizations to leading edge innovations in multi-channel sales and distribution. We have transformed organizations to use technology to expand and revolutionize their business models. Our services directly impact the consumer experience of our clients’ brands, and allow our clients to reach more consumers.
Software and Hi-Tech.
Our core competency is in providing complex software product development services to meet software and technology companies’ constant need for innovation and agility. We help some of the most prominent software brands in the world build, what we believe to be, the best software. Through our extensive experience with many industry leaders in Hi-Tech R&D, software engineering and integration, we have developed proprietary internal processes, methodologies and IT infrastructure, which give us an edge when it comes to serving customers in the Hi-Tech and Software Product markets. Our services span the complete software development lifecycle for software product development using our comprehensive development methodologies, testing, performance tuning, deployment, maintenance and support.
Media and Entertainment.
We help our media and entertainment clients build products and solutions for all modern platforms including web media streaming and mobile information delivery. Our solutions help clients develop new revenue sources, accelerate the creation, collection, packaging and management of content and reach broader audiences. We serve varied clients in this vertical including search engine providers, entertainment media, news providers, broadcasting companies, financial information providers, content distributors, knowledge management organizations and advertising networks.
Life Sciences and Healthcare
. We help our customers in the Healthcare industry respond to changing regulatory environments and improve the quality of care while managing the cost of care. Our professionals deliver an end-to-end experience that includes strategy, architecture, development and managed services to clients ranging from the traditional healthcare providers to innovative startups. In the Life Sciences category, we partner with global pharmaceutical, medical technology and biotechnology companies to deliver sophisticated scientific informatics and innovative enterprise technology solutions. Our personnel in Life Sciences leverage their vast technology expertise to offer deep scientific and mathematical knowledge to broad-based initiatives. Our Life Sciences solutions enable clients to speed research and accelerate time-to-market while improving collaboration, knowledge management and operational excellence.
We also serve the diverse technology needs of clients in the energy, telecommunications, automotive and manufacturing industries, as well as government clients. These clients are included in our Emerging verticals which are further discussed in “Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” in Part II of this annual report.
Clients
Our clients primarily consist of Forbes Global 2000 corporations located in North America, Europe, CIS and APAC. We maintain a geographically diverse client base with
58.0%
of our
2017
revenues derived from clients located in North America,
35.2%
from clients in Europe,
4.7%
from clients in the CIS and
2.1%
from our clients in APAC. Our sustained growth and increased capabilities are furthered by both organic growth and strategic acquisitions. We continually evaluate potential acquisition targets that can expand our vertical-specific domain expertise, geographic footprint, service portfolio, client base and management expertise.
Our focus on delivering quality to our clients is reflected by an average of
94.9%
and
85.7%
of our revenues in
2017
coming from clients that had used our services for at least one and two years, respectively. We have long-standing relationships with many of our top customers, however, we remain committed to diversifying our client base and we expect client concentration from our top clients to continue to decrease over the long-term. The following table shows revenues from the top five and ten customers in the respective year as a percentage of revenues for that year:
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% of Revenues for Year Ended December 31,
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2017
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2016
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2015
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Top five clients
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24.0
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%
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28.4
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%
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32.8
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%
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Top ten clients
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33.9
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%
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38.4
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%
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44.1
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%
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The following table shows the distribution of our clients by revenues for the periods presented:
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Year Ended December 31,
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Revenues Greater Than or Equal To
|
2017
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2016
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2015
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$0.1 million
|
460
|
|
431
|
|
365
|
$0.5 million
|
316
|
|
266
|
|
211
|
$1 million
|
232
|
|
182
|
|
136
|
$5 million
|
63
|
|
45
|
|
33
|
$10 million
|
26
|
|
19
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14
|
$20 million
|
10
|
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7
|
|
7
|
See “Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” in Part II of this annual report for additional information related to revenue.
See Note
17
“Segment Information” in the notes to our consolidated financial statements in this Annual Report on Form 10-K for information regarding long-lived assets and client revenue by geographic location as well as financial information related to our reportable segments.
Sales and Marketing
Our sales and marketing efforts support our business strategy to increase revenues from new and existing clients through our senior management, sales and business development staff, account managers, and technical specialists. We maintain a dedicated sales force and a marketing team, which coordinates corporate-level branding efforts such as participation in and hosting of industry conferences and events and sponsorship of programming competitions.
Given our focus on providing technical solutions to our clients’ complex challenges, our IT professionals play an integral role in engaging with clients on potential business opportunities. Our account managers maintain direct client relationships and are tasked with identifying new business opportunities and responding to requests-for-proposals (“RFPs”). Account managers typically engage technical and other specialists when pursuing opportunities. This sales model has been effective in promoting repeat business and growth from within our existing client base.
In addition to effective client management, we believe that our reputation as a premium provider of software engineering solutions and information technology services drives additional business from inbound requests, referrals and RFPs. We enjoy published recognition from third-party industry observers, such as Forrester Research, Forbes Research, Everest Group, Zinnov, CIO Magazine, Information Week, and Software Magazine.
Our Delivery Model
We believe the development of a robust global delivery model creates a key competitive advantage, enabling us to better understand and meet our clients’ diverse needs and to provide a compelling value proposition. We serve clients through on-site, off-site and offshore locations across the world in Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, Hungary, Poland, India, China, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Bulgaria, Armenia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Netherlands, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Hong Kong, Austria, Spain, Ireland and Australia. Our delivery centers are located strategically to offer a strong, diversified and cost-effective delivery platform to serve clients across North America, Europe and APAC. Our largest delivery centers are located in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. We continuously grow our delivery platform both organically and through acquired delivery centers and client management locations. Our revenue generating personnel numbered
22,998
as of
December 31, 2017
.
As of
December 31, 2017
we had
7,372
IT professionals located in Belarus. The majority of these IT professionals are located in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, which is well-positioned to serve as a prime IT outsourcing destination given its strong industrial base and established educational infrastructure. Furthermore, the IT industry in Belarus has been strongly supported by its government, which has taken steps to encourage investment in the IT sector through long-term tax incentives.
Our locations in Ukraine and Russia offer many of the same benefits as Belarus, including educational infrastructure, availability of qualified software engineers and government support of the IT industry. As of
December 31, 2017
, we had
4,818
IT professionals in Ukraine and
3,802
IT professionals in Russia. Our delivery model has not been materially affected by the political and economic uncertainty in Russia or Ukraine to date.
Our other significant locations with IT professionals are Hungary with
1,460
, the United States with
1,316
, Poland with
1,167
, India with
822
and China with
509
as of
December 31, 2017
.
Human Capital
Attracting and retaining employees is a key factor in our ability to grow our revenues and meet our clients’ needs. We have dedicated full-time employees that oversee all aspects of our human capital management process including a professional talent acquisition team whose objective is to locate and attract qualified and experienced IT professionals within various EPAM locations. It is critical that we effectively plan our short-term and long-term recruitment needs and deploy the necessary personnel and processes to optimize utilization and quickly satisfy the demands of our clients. As our business grows, we also focus on hiring and retaining individuals with appropriate skills to fill our executive, finance, legal, HR and other key management positions.
At
December 31, 2017
,
2016
and
2015
, we had a total of
25,962
,
22,383
and 18,354 employees, respectively. Of these employees, as of
December 31, 2017
,
2016
and
2015
, respectively,
22,998
,
19,670
and 16,078 were revenue generating IT professionals.
In our competitive industry, the ability to hire and retain highly-skilled information technology professionals is critical to our success. We believe the quality of our employees serves as a key point of differentiation in how we deliver a superior value proposition to our clients. To attract, retain and motivate our IT professionals, we offer a challenging work environment, ongoing skills development initiatives, attractive career advancement, and promotion opportunities thus providing an environment and culture that rewards entrepreneurial initiative and performance.
Historically, we developed our base of IT professionals by hiring highly-qualified, experienced IT professionals from the CIS and CEE regions and by recruiting students from the regions’ leading universities. The quality and academic prestige of the CIS and CEE educational systems are renowned worldwide and we have strong relationships with the leading institutions in these geographies. We have established EPAM delivery centers near many of these university campuses. Our ongoing involvement with these universities includes supporting EPAM-branded research labs, developing training courses, providing teaching equipment, actively supporting curriculum development and engaging students to identify their talents and interests. Our relationships with these technical institutions provide us access to a highly-qualified talent pool.
We believe that we maintain a good working relationship with our employees and our employees have not entered into any collective bargaining agreements (other than broad industry-wide agreements as required in certain countries in Europe and Mexico) or engaged in any labor disputes.
Training and Development
We dedicate significant resources to the training and development of our IT professionals. We believe in the importance of supporting educational initiatives and we sponsor employees’ participation in internal and external training and certifications.
We provide training, continuing education and career development programs for both entry-level and experienced IT professionals. Entry-level IT professionals undergo a rigorous training program that consists of approximately three to six months of classroom training, as well as numerous hours of hands-on training through actual engagements. This comprehensive program results in employees who are highly proficient and possess deep technical expertise that enables them to immediately serve our clients’ needs. For our mid-level and senior IT professionals, we offer continuing education programs aimed at helping them advance in their careers. We also provide mentoring opportunities, management and soft skills training, intensive workshops and management and technical advancement programs in order to support the development of middle and senior management through formal leadership training, evaluation, development and promotion.
Quality and Process Management
We have invested resources in developing a proprietary suite of internal applications and tools to manage all aspects of our delivery process. These applications and tools are targeted to reduce costs and security risks, while providing control and visibility across all project lifecycle stages both internally and to our clients. In addition, these applications, tools, methodologies and infrastructure allow us to seamlessly deliver services and solutions to global clients, further strengthening our relationships with them.
We are an ISAE 3402 Type 2 certified IT services provider. This certification is a widely recognized auditing standard developed by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and it serves as additional assurance to our clients regarding the control environment and the security of their sensitive data. Furthermore, this is an important certification for firms in data and information-intensive industries, as well as any organization that is subject to the internal controls certification requirements of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, as amended, or the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Our ISAE 3402 Type 2 certification, in addition to our multiple ISO 27001:2013 and ISO 9001:2015 attestations, underscores our focus on establishing stringent security standards and internal controls.
Our proprietary ISO 9001:2015 and CMMI-certified Quality Management System has been documented, implemented and maintained to ensure the timely delivery of software development services to our clients. We have also developed sophisticated project management techniques facilitated through our Project Management Center, a web-based collaborative environment for software development, which we consider critical to meeting or exceeding the service levels required by our clients.
Our Quality Management System ensures that we provide timely delivery of software development services to enhance client satisfaction by enabling:
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objective valuation of the performed process, work products and services against the client’s process descriptions, standards and procedures;
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•
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identification, documentation and timely resolution of noncompliance issues;
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•
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feedback to the client’s project staff and managers on the results of quality assurance activities;
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monitoring and improvement of the software development process to ensure adopted standards and procedures are implemented and flaws are detected and resolved in a timely manner; and
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execution of planned and systematic problem prevention activities.
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Our proprietary Project Management Center supports our software development delivery model. Our Project Management Center is effective in reducing risks and providing control and visibility across all project lifecycle stages based on the following features:
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multi-site, multi-project capabilities;
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•
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activity-based software development lifecycle, which fully tracks the software development activities through the project documentation;
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project, role-based access control, which can be available to us, clients and third parties;
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fully configurable workflow engine with built-in notification and messaging;
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extensive reporting capabilities and tracking of key performance indicators; and
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•
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integration with Microsoft Project and Outlook.
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The transparency and visibility into software development project deliverables, resource management, team messaging and project-related documents and files provided by our Project Management Center promotes collaboration and strengthens our relationships with our clients. Improved traceability enables significant time savings and cost reductions for business users and IT management during change management for the software development lifecycle. The combination of our Project Management Center with our other proprietary internal applications enhances our offering by reducing errors, increasing quality, effectiveness and oversight, and improving maintenance time.
Competition
The markets in which we compete are changing rapidly and we face competition from both global technology solutions providers as well as those based primarily in specific geographies with lower cost labor such as CEE, India and China. We believe that the principal competitive factors in our business include technical expertise and industry knowledge, end-to-end solution offerings, reputation and track record for high-quality and on-time delivery of work, effective employee recruiting, training and retention, responsiveness to clients’ business needs, scale, financial stability and price.
We face competition primarily from Accenture, Atos Origin, Capgemini, Cognizant Technology Solutions, Deloitte Digital, DXC Technology, Exlservice, Genpact, GlobalLogic, Globant S.A., HCL Technologies, HP Enterprise, IBM Global Services, Infosys Technologies, Luxoft Holding, Inc., Mindtree, Syntel, Inc., Perficient, Tata Consultancy Services, Virtusa Corporation, and Wipro, among others. Additionally, we compete with numerous smaller local companies in the various geographic markets in which we operate.
We believe that our focus on complex software product development solutions, our technical employee base, and the development and continuous improvement in process methodologies, applications and tools position us well to compete effectively in the future.
Intellectual Property
Protecting our intellectual property rights is important to our business. We have invested, and will continue to invest, in research and development to enhance our domain knowledge and create complex, specialized solutions for our clients. We rely on a combination of intellectual property laws, trade secrets, confidentiality procedures and contractual provisions to protect our intellectual property. We require our employees, vendors and independent contractors to enter into written agreements upon the commencement of their relationships with us, which assign to us all intellectual property and work product made, developed or conceived by them in connection with their employment with us. These agreements also provide that any confidential or proprietary information disclosed or otherwise made available by us remains confidential.
We also enter into confidentiality and non-disclosure agreements with our clients. These customary agreements cover our use of the clients’ software systems and platforms as our clients usually own the intellectual property in the products we develop for them. Furthermore, we usually grant a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, nonexclusive, transferable and non-revocable license to our clients to use our preexisting intellectual property, but only to the extent necessary in order to use the software or systems we developed for them.
Regulations
Due to the industry and geographic diversity of our operations and services, our operations are subject to a variety of rules and regulations. Several foreign and U.S. federal and state agencies regulate various aspects of our business. See “Item 1A. Risk Factors — Risks Relating to Our Business — We are subject to laws and regulations in the United States and other countries in which we operate, including export restrictions, economic sanctions and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, or FCPA, and similar anti-corruption laws. If we are not in compliance with applicable legal requirements, we may be subject to civil or criminal penalties and other remedial measures”.
Corporate Information
EPAM Systems, Inc. was incorporated in the State of Delaware on December 18, 2002. Our predecessor entity was founded in 1993. Our principal executive offices are located at 41 University Drive, Suite 202, Newtown, Pennsylvania 18940 and our telephone number is 267-759-9000. We maintain a website at
http://www.epam.com.
Our website and the information accessible through our website are not incorporated into this annual report.
We make certain filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”), including our annual report on Form 10-K, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, current reports on Form 8-K, and all amendments and exhibits to those reports. We make such filings available free of charge through the Investor Relations section of our website,
http://investors.epam.com
, as soon as reasonably practicable after they are filed with the SEC. The filings are also available through the SEC at the SEC’s Public Reference Room at 100 F Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20549 or by calling 1-800-SEC-0330. In addition, these filings are available on the internet at
http://www.sec.gov
. Our press releases and most recent investor presentation are also available on our website. The information on our website does not constitute a part of this annual report.
Item 1A. Risk Factors
Our operations and financial results are subject to various risks and uncertainties, including but not limited to those described below, which could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, cash flows, and the trading price of our common stock. You should carefully review the following discussion of the most significant risk factors applicable to us, which we have listed below and are not necessarily in order of importance or probability of occurrence. Additionally, forward-looking statements are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties, some of which cannot be predicted or quantified. See “Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements”.
Risks Relating to Our Business
We may be unable to effectively manage our rapid growth or achieve anticipated growth, which could place significant strain on our management personnel, systems and resources.
We have experienced rapid growth and significantly expanded our business over the past several years, both organically and through acquisitions. Our rapid growth has placed, and will continue to place, significant demands on our management and our administrative, operational and financial infrastructure. Continued expansion increases the challenges we face in:
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recruiting, training and retaining sufficiently skilled IT professionals and management personnel;
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adhering to and further improving our high-quality process execution standards and maintaining high levels of client satisfaction;
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managing a larger number of clients in a greater number of industries and locations;
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maintaining effective oversight of personnel and delivery centers;
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•
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coordinating effectively across geographies and business units to execute our strategic plan; and
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•
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developing and improving our internal administrative, operational and financial infrastructure.
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Moreover, we intend to continue our expansion for the foreseeable future and pursue available opportunities. As we introduce new services or enter into new markets, we may face new market, technological, operational, compliance and administrative risks and challenges. As a result of these challenges associated with expansion, we may not be able to achieve our anticipated growth and our business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations could be materially adversely affected.
Our failure to successfully attract, train and retain new IT professionals with the qualifications necessary to fulfill the needs of our existing and future clients could materially adversely affect our ability to provide high quality services to those clients.
The ability to hire and retain highly-skilled information technology professionals is critical to our success. To maintain and renew existing engagements and obtain new business, we must attract, train and retain skilled IT professionals, including those with management experience. Competition for IT professionals can be intense in the markets where we operate. If we are unable to hire or retain all of the IT professionals necessary to meet our ongoing and future business needs, we may have to forgo projects due to lack of resources.
A significant increase in the attrition rate among IT professionals with specialized skills could decrease our operating efficiency and productivity and could lead to a decline in demand for our services. In addition, any reductions in headcount for economic or business reasons, however temporary, could negatively affect our reputation as an employer, and our ability to hire IT professionals to meet our business requirements may suffer.
Increases in wages for our IT professionals and other compensation expense could prevent us from sustaining our competitive advantage and result in dilution to our stockholders.
Wage costs for IT professionals in CIS, CEE and APAC, and certain other geographies in which we operate are lower than comparable wage costs in more developed countries. However, wage costs in the service industry in these countries may increase at a faster rate than in the past, which ultimately may make us less competitive unless we are able to increase the efficiency and productivity of our IT professionals. Wage inflation may also increase our cost of providing services and reduce our profitability.
Additionally, we have granted certain equity-based awards under our stock incentive plans and entered into other stock-based compensation arrangements in the past, and expect to continue this practice. The expenses associated with stock-based compensation may reduce the attractiveness to us of issuing equity awards under our equity incentive plan. However, if we do not grant equity awards, or if we reduce the value of equity awards we grant, we may not be able to attract and retain key personnel. If we grant more equity awards to attract and retain key personnel, the expenses associated with such additional equity awards could materially adversely affect our results of operations. The issuance of equity-based compensation also results in additional dilution to our stockholders.
Our success depends substantially on the continuing efforts of our senior executives and other key personnel, and our business may be severely disrupted if we lose their services.
Our future success heavily depends upon the continued services of our senior executives and other key employees. If one or more of our senior executives or key employees are unable or unwilling to continue in their present positions, it could disrupt our business operations, and we may not be able to replace them easily or at all. In addition, competition for senior executives and key personnel in our industry is intense, and we may be unable to retain our senior executives and key personnel or attract and retain new senior executives and key personnel in the future, in which case our business may be severely disrupted. If any of our senior executives or key personnel, such as business development managers, joins a competitor or forms a competing company, we may lose clients, suppliers, know-how and key IT professionals and staff members to them.
Our profitability will suffer if we are not able to maintain our resource utilization and productivity levels.
Our profitability is significantly impacted by our utilization and productivity levels of fixed-cost resources, such as our professionals as well as other resources such as computers and office space. Our ability to manage our utilization levels depends significantly on our ability to hire and train high-performing IT professionals, to plan effectively for future needs, to staff projects appropriately, and on the general economy and its effect on our clients and their business decisions regarding the use of our services. If we experience a slowdown or stoppage of work for any client or on any project for which we have dedicated IT professionals or facilities, we may not be able to reallocate these IT professionals and facilities to other clients and projects to keep their utilization and productivity levels high. If we are not able to maintain optimal resource utilization levels without corresponding cost reductions or price increases, our profitability will suffer.
Our global business exposes us to operational and economic risks.
We are a global company with substantial international operations. Our revenues from clients outside North America represented
42.0%
,
42.2%
and
46.4%
of our revenues including reimbursable expenses and other revenues for
2017
,
2016
and
2015
, respectively. The majority of our personnel, along with our development and delivery centers, are located in the CIS and CEE. The global nature of our business creates operational and economic risks.
Risks inherent in conducting international operations include:
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foreign exchange fluctuations;
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application and imposition of protective legislation and regulations relating to import or export, including tariffs, quotas and other trade protection measures;
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difficulties in enforcing intellectual property and/or contractual rights;
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complying with a wide variety of foreign laws;
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potentially adverse tax consequences;
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competition from companies with more experience in a particular country or with international operations; and
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overall foreign policy and variability of foreign economic conditions.
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We earn our revenues and incur our expenses in multiple currencies, which exposes us to foreign exchange risks relating to revenues, receivables, compensation, purchases and capital expenditures. Currency exchange volatility caused by political or economic instability or other factors, could materially impact our results. See “Item 7A. Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures about Market Risk.”
The IT services industry is particularly sensitive to the economic environment and the industry tends to decline during general economic downturns. Given our significant revenues from North America and Europe, if those economies weaken or slow, pricing for our services may be depressed and our clients may reduce or postpone their technology spending significantly, which may in turn lower the demand for our services and negatively affect our revenues and profitability.
War, terrorism, other acts of violence or natural or manmade disasters may affect the markets in which we operate, our clients, and our service delivery.
Our business may be negatively affected by instability, disruption or destruction in a geographic region in which we operate, regardless of cause, including war, terrorism, riot, civil insurrection or social unrest; and natural or manmade disasters, including famine, flood, fire, earthquake, storm or disease. Such events may cause clients to delay their decisions on spending for IT services and give rise to sudden significant changes in regional and global economic conditions and cycles. These events also pose significant risks to our people and to physical facilities and operations around the world, whether the facilities are ours or those of our clients, which could materially adversely affect our financial results. By disrupting communications and travel, giving rise to travel restrictions, and increasing the difficulty of obtaining and retaining highly-skilled and qualified IT professionals, these events could make it difficult or impossible for us to deliver services to our clients. Travel restrictions could cause us to incur additional unexpected labor costs and expenses or could restrain our ability to retain the skilled IT professionals we need for our operations. In addition, any extended disruptions of electricity, other public utilities or network services at our facilities, as well as system failures at, or security breaches in, our facilities or systems, could also adversely affect our ability to serve our clients.
Emerging markets are subject to greater risks than more developed markets, including significant legal, economic, tax and political risks.
We have significant operations in CIS and CEE countries, India and other Asian countries, which are generally considered to be emerging markets. Emerging markets are vulnerable to market downturns and economic slowdowns elsewhere in the world and are subject to greater risks than more developed markets, including those that may result from foreign laws and regulations, the potential imposition of trade or foreign exchange restrictions or sanctions, tax increases, fluctuations in exchange rates, inflation, unstable political and military situations, labor issues, and less established legal systems. The economies of certain countries where we operate have experienced periods of considerable instability and have been subject to abrupt downturns. Such economic instability and any future deterioration in the international economic situation could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.
Our operations may be adversely affected by ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
Continuing military activities in Ukraine have combined with Ukraine’s weak economic conditions to fuel ongoing economic uncertainty in Ukraine, Russia and other markets. The European Union, United States and other nations have imposed, and may continue imposing further, economic sanctions, including specific sanctions on certain Russian entities (specifically in the energy, defense and financial sectors). Prolonged political instability in Ukraine, sanctions against Russia and Russia’s potential response to such sanctions could have a material adverse effect on our operations. We have delivery centers in the Ukraine employing
4,818
IT professionals as of December 31, 2017, none of which are located in the most volatile regions of Eastern Ukraine. We also have delivery centers in Russia, employing
3,802
IT professionals as of December 31, 2017 located in various cities including Moscow and St. Petersburg. To date we have not experienced any interruption in our office infrastructure, utility supply or Internet connectivity needed to support our clients. We continue to monitor the situation closely. Our contingency plans include relocating work and/or personnel to other locations and adding new locations, as appropriate.
The U.S. Congress and Trump administration may make substantial changes to fiscal, political, regulatory and other federal policies that may adversely affect our business, financial condition, operating results and cash flows.
Changes in general economic or political conditions in the United States or other regions could adversely affect our business. For example, the administration under President Donald Trump has indicated that it may propose significant changes with respect to a variety of issues, including international trade agreements, import and export regulations, tariffs and customs duties, foreign relations, immigration laws, and corporate governance laws, that could have a positive or negative impact on our business.
We do not have long-term commitments from our clients, and our clients may terminate contracts before completion or choose not to renew contracts. A loss of business from significant clients could materially affect our results of operations.
Our ability to maintain continuing relationships with our major clients is essential to the growth and profitability of our business. However, the volume of work performed for any specific client is likely to vary from year to year, especially since we generally are not our clients’ exclusive IT services provider and we generally do not have long-term commitments from clients to purchase our services. The ability of our clients to terminate engagements with or without cause makes our future revenues uncertain. Although a substantial majority of our revenues are generated from clients who also contributed to our revenues during the prior year, our engagements with our clients are typically for projects that are singular in nature. Therefore, we must seek to obtain new engagements when our current engagements end.
There are a number of factors relating to our clients that are outside of our control, which might lead them to terminate a contract or project with us, including a client’s:
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financial difficulties;
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corporate restructuring, or mergers and acquisitions activity;
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change in strategic priorities, resulting in elimination of the impetus for the project or a reduced level of technology spending;
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change in outsourcing strategy resulting in moving more work to the client’s in-house technology departments or to our competitors; and
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replacement of existing software with packaged software supported by licensors.
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Termination or non-renewal of a customer contract could cause us to experience a higher than expected number of unassigned employees and thus compress our margins until we are able to reduce or reallocate our headcount. The loss of any of our major clients, or a significant decrease in the volume of work they outsource to us or the price at which we sell our services to them, if not replaced by new client engagements, could materially adversely affect our revenues and results of operations.
Our revenues are highly dependent on a limited number of industries, and any decrease in demand for outsourced services in these industries could reduce our revenues and adversely affect our results of operations.
A substantial portion of our clients is concentrated in five specific industry verticals: Financial Services; Software and Hi-Tech; Media and Entertainment; Travel and Consumer; and Life Sciences and Healthcare. Our business growth largely depends on continued demand for our services from clients in these five industry verticals and other industries that we may target in the future, as well as on trends in these industries to outsource IT services.
A downturn in any of our targeted industries, a slowdown or reversal of the trend to outsource IT services in any of these industries or the introduction of regulations that restrict or discourage companies from outsourcing could result in a decrease in the demand for our services and materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations. Other developments in the industries in which we operate may also lead to a decline in the demand for our services, and we may not be able to successfully anticipate and prepare for any such changes. Decreased demand for our services, or increased pricing pressure on us from our clients in these key industries could adversely affect our results of operations.
If our pricing structures are based on inaccurate expectations and assumptions regarding the cost and complexity of performing our work, or if we are not able to maintain favorable pricing for our services, then our contracts could be unprofitable.
We face a number of risks when pricing our contracts and setting terms with our clients. Our pricing is highly dependent on our internal forecasts, assumptions and predictions about our projects, the marketplace, global economic conditions (including foreign exchange volatility), and the coordination of operations and personnel in multiple locations with different skill sets and competencies. Our pricing and cost estimates for the work that we perform may include anticipated long-term cost savings that we expect to achieve and sustain over the life of the contract. Because of these inherent uncertainties, we may underprice our projects (particularly with fixed-price contracts), fail to accurately estimate the costs of performing the work or fail to accurately assess the risks associated with potential contracts. Any increased or unexpected costs, delays or failures to achieve anticipated cost savings, or unexpected risks we encounter in connection with the performance of this work, including those caused by factors outside our control, could make these contracts less profitable or unprofitable. Moreover, if we are not able to pass on to our clients increases in compensation costs (whether driven by competition for talent or ordinary-course pay increases) or charge premium prices when justified by market demand or the type of service, our profitability may suffer.
In addition, a number of our contracts contain pricing terms that condition a portion of the payment of fees by the client on our ability to meet defined performance goals, service levels and completion schedules set forth in the contracts. Our failure to meet such performance goals, service levels or completion schedules or our failure to meet client expectations in such contracts may result in less profitable or unprofitable engagements.
If we are not successful in managing increasingly large and complex projects, we may not achieve our financial goals and our results of operations could be adversely affected.
To successfully perform larger and more complex projects, we need to establish and maintain effective, close relationships with our clients, continue high levels of client satisfaction and develop a thorough understanding of our clients’ operations. In addition, we may face a number of challenges managing larger and more complex projects, including:
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maintaining high-quality control and process execution standards;
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maintaining planned resource utilization rates on a consistent basis and using an efficient mix of onsite and offshore staffing;
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maintaining productivity levels and implementing necessary process improvements; and
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Our ability to successfully manage large and complex projects depends significantly on the skills of our management personnel and IT professionals. In addition, large and complex projects may involve multiple engagements or stages, and there is a risk that a client may choose not to retain us for additional stages or may cancel or delay additional planned engagements. Such cancellations or delays may make it difficult to plan our project resource requirements. If we fail to successfully obtain engagements for large and complex projects, we may not achieve our revenue growth and other financial goals. Even if we are successful in obtaining such engagements, failure to effectively manage these large and complex projects could damage our reputation, cause us to lose business, compress our margins and adversely affect our business and results of operations.
We face risks associated with having a long selling and implementation cycle for our services that require us to make significant resource commitments prior to realizing revenues for those services.
We have a long selling cycle for our IT services. Before potential clients commit to use our services, they require us to expend substantial time and resources educating them on the value of our services and our ability to meet their requirements. Therefore, our selling cycle is subject to many risks and delays over which we have little or no control, including our clients’ decision to select another IT service provider or in-house resources to perform the services and the timing of our clients’ budget cycles and approval processes. If our sales cycle unexpectedly lengthens for one or more large projects, it would negatively affect the timing of our revenues and our revenue growth. For certain clients, we may begin work and incur costs prior to executing a contract. A delay in our ability to obtain a signed agreement or other persuasive evidence of an arrangement, or to complete certain contract requirements in a particular quarter, could reduce our revenues in that quarter.
Implementing our services also involves a significant commitment of resources over an extended period of time from both our clients and us. Our current and future clients may not be willing or able to invest the time and resources necessary to implement our services, and we may fail to close sales with potential clients to whom we have devoted significant time and resources. Any significant failure to generate revenues or delays in recognizing revenues after incurring costs related to our sales or services process could materially adversely affect our business.
If we are unable to collect our receivables from, or bill our unbilled services to our clients, our results of operations and cash flows could be materially adversely affected.
Our business depends on our ability to successfully obtain payment from our clients of the amounts they owe us for work performed. There is no guarantee that we will accurately assess the creditworthiness of our clients. If our clients suffer financial difficulties, it could cause clients to delay payments to us, request modifications to their payment arrangements that could increase our receivables balance, or default on their payment obligations to us. Timely collection of client balances also depends on our ability to complete our contractual commitments and bill and collect our contracted revenues. We usually bill and collect on relatively short cycles. If we are unable to meet our contractual requirements, we might experience delays in collection of and/or be unable to collect our client balances, and if this occurs, our results of operations and cash flows could be materially adversely affected.
We face intense competition for clients and opportunities from onshore and offshore IT services companies, and increased competition, our inability to compete successfully against competitors, pricing pressures or loss of market share could materially adversely affect our business.
The market for IT services is highly competitive, and we expect competition to persist and intensify. We face competition from offshore IT services providers in other outsourcing destinations with low wage costs such as India and China, as well as competition from large, global consulting and outsourcing firms and in-house IT departments of large corporations. Clients tend to engage multiple IT services providers instead of using an exclusive IT services provider, which could reduce our revenues to the extent that clients obtain services from other competing IT services providers. Clients may prefer IT services providers that have more locations or that are based in countries more cost-competitive or more stable than some of the emerging markets in which we operate.
Current or prospective clients may elect to perform certain services themselves or may be discouraged from transferring services from onshore to offshore IT services providers, which could seriously harm our ability to compete effectively with competitors that provide services from within the countries in which our clients operate.
Some of our present and potential competitors may have substantially greater financial, marketing or technical resources, therefore, we may be unable to retain our clients while competing against such competitors. Increased competition, our inability to compete successfully, pricing pressures or loss of market share could materially adversely affect our business. Client buying patterns can change if clients become more price sensitive and accepting of low-cost suppliers with less emphasis on quality.
Our ability to generate and retain business depends on our reputation in the marketplace.
Our services are marketed to clients and prospective clients based on a number of factors. Since many of our specific client engagements involve unique services and solutions, our corporate reputation is a significant factor in our clients’ evaluation of whether to engage our service, and our clients’ perception of our ability to add value through our services is critical to the profitability of our engagements. We believe the EPAM brand name and our reputation are important corporate assets that help distinguish our services from those of our competitors and contribute to our efforts to recruit and retain talented employees.
However, our corporate reputation is potentially susceptible to damage by actions or statements made by current or former clients and employees, competitors, vendors, adversaries in legal proceedings, government regulators, as well as members of the investment community and the media. There is a risk that negative information about our company, even if untrue, could adversely affect our business. In particular, damage to our reputation could be challenging to repair, could make potential or existing clients reluctant to select us for new engagements, and could adversely affect our recruitment and retention efforts. Damage to our reputation could also reduce the value and effectiveness of the EPAM brand name and could reduce investor confidence in us.
If we are unable to adapt to rapidly changing technologies, methodologies and evolving industry standards we may lose clients and our business could be materially adversely affected.
Rapidly changing technologies, methodologies and evolving industry standards are inherent in the market for our services. Our future success will depend in part upon our ability to anticipate developments in IT services, enhance our existing services and to develop and introduce new services to keep pace with such changes and developments and to meet changing client needs. The process of developing our client solutions is extremely complex and is expected to become increasingly complex and expensive in the future due to the introduction of new platforms, operating systems, technologies and methodologies. Our ability to keep pace with, anticipate or respond to these changes is subject to a number of risks, including that:
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we may find it difficult or costly to update our services, applications, tools and software and to develop new services quickly enough to meet our clients’ needs;
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we may find it difficult or costly to make some features of our software work effectively and securely over the Internet or with new or changed operating systems;
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we may find it difficult or costly to update our software and services to keep pace with business, evolving industry standards, methodologies, regulatory and other developments in the industries where our clients operate; and
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we may find it difficult to maintain a high level of quality in implementing new technologies and methodologies.
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We may not be successful in anticipating or responding to these developments in a timely manner, or if we do respond, the services, technologies or methodologies we develop or implement may not be successful in the marketplace. Further, services, technologies or methodologies that are developed by our competitors may render our services non-competitive or obsolete. Our failure to enhance our existing services and to develop and introduce new services to promptly address the needs of our clients could materially adversely affect our business.
Undetected software design defects, errors or failures may result in loss of business or in liabilities that could materially adversely affect our business.
Our software development solutions involve a high degree of technological complexity, have unique specifications and could contain design defects or software errors that are difficult to detect and correct. Errors or defects may result in the loss of current clients and loss of, or delay in, revenues, loss of market share, loss of client data, a failure to attract new clients or achieve market acceptance, diversion of development resources and increased support or service costs. We cannot provide assurance that, despite testing by our clients and us, errors will not be found in new software product development solutions, which could result in litigation, other claims for damages against us, as well as reputational harm and thus could materially adversely affect our business.
Security breaches and other disruptions to network security could compromise our information and expose us to liability, which would cause our business and reputation to suffer.
In the ordinary course of business, we have access to collect, store, process, and transmit sensitive or confidential data, including intellectual property, our proprietary business information and that of our clients, and personally identifiable information of our clients and employees, in our data centers and on our networks. Physical security and the secure processing, maintenance and transmission of this information is critical to our operations and business strategy. Despite our security measures, our information technology and infrastructure may be vulnerable to attacks by hackers or breached due to human error, malfeasance or other disruptions. Any such breach could compromise our networks and the information stored there could be accessed, publicly disclosed, misappropriated, lost or stolen. Such a breach or disruption could also disrupt our operations and the services we provide to customers, damage our reputation, and cause a loss of confidence in our products and services, as well as require us to expend significant resources to protect against further breaches and to rectify problems caused by these events. Any such access, disclosure or other loss of information could result in legal claims or proceedings, liability under applicable laws, and regulatory penalties and could adversely affect our business, revenues and competitive position.
We may be liable to our clients for damages caused by the disclosure of confidential information, system failures or errors.
If any person, including any of our personnel, misappropriates sensitive or confidential client information, including personally identifiable information, we could be subject to significant liability from our clients or from our clients’ customers for breaching contractual confidentiality provisions or privacy laws. Some of our client agreements do not limit our potential liability for certain occurrences, including breaches of confidentiality and infringement indemnity. Furthermore, breaches of confidentiality may entitle the aggrieved party to equitable remedies, including injunctive relief. Any such breach or misappropriation resulting in unauthorized disclosure of sensitive or confidential client information, or a violation of intellectual property rights, whether through employee misconduct, breach of our computer systems, systems failure or otherwise, may subject us to liabilities, damage our reputation and cause us to lose clients.
If we cause disruptions to our clients’ businesses or provide inadequate service, our clients may have claims for substantial damages against us, which could cause us to lose clients, have a negative effect on our reputation and adversely affect our results of operations.
If our IT professionals make errors in the course of delivering services to our clients or fail to consistently meet the service requirements of a client, these errors or failures could disrupt the client’s business, which could result in a reduction in our revenues or a claim for substantial damages against us, and could also result in a client terminating our engagement. Any failure in a client’s system or breach of security relating to the services we provide to the client could damage our reputation or result in a claim for substantial damages against us, regardless of our responsibility for such failure. The assertion of one or more large claims against us, whether or not successful, could materially adversely affect our reputation, business, financial condition and results of operations.
A significant failure in our telecommunications or IT infrastructure or systems could harm our service model, which could result in a reduction of our revenue and otherwise disrupt our business.
Part of our service model is to maintain active voice and data communications, financial control, accounting, customer service and other data processing systems between our clients’ offices, our delivery centers and our client management locations. Moreover, many of our key systems for corporate operations are internally-developed applications. Our business activities may be materially disrupted in the event of a partial or complete failure of any of these internet, IT or communication systems, which could be caused by, among other things, software malfunction, computer virus attacks, conversion errors due to system upgrading, damage from fire, earthquake, power loss, telecommunications failure, unauthorized entry, demands placed on internet infrastructure by growing numbers of users and time spent online or increased bandwidth requirements or other events beyond our control. Loss of all or part of the infrastructure or systems for a period of time could hinder our performance or our ability to complete client projects on time which, in turn, could lead to a reduction of our revenue or otherwise materially adversely affect our business and business reputation.
We may invest substantial cash in new facilities and physical infrastructure, and our profitability could be reduced if our business does not grow proportionately.
As our business grows, we may invest in new facilities and physical infrastructure. We may encounter cost overruns or project delays in connection with new facilities. These expansions will likely increase our fixed costs and if we are unable to grow our business and revenues proportionately, our profitability may be reduced.
If we fail to integrate or manage acquired companies efficiently, or if the acquired companies do not perform to our expectations, our overall profitability and growth plans could be materially adversely affected.
Part of our expansion strategy includes strategic acquisitions. These transactions involve significant challenges, including the risk that an acquisition does not advance our business strategy, that we do not achieve a satisfactory return on our investment, that we are unable to successfully integrate an acquired company’s employees, client relationships and operations, and that the transactions divert significant management attention and financial resources from our ongoing business. These challenges could disrupt our ongoing business and increase our expenses, including causing us to incur significant one-time expenses and write-offs, and making it more difficult and complex for our management to effectively manage our operations. If we are not able to successfully integrate an acquired entity and its operations and to realize the benefits envisioned for such acquisition, our overall growth and profitability plans may be adversely affected.
Our effective tax rate could be materially adversely affected by several factors.
We conduct business globally and file income tax returns in multiple jurisdictions. Our effective tax rate could be materially adversely affected by several factors, including changes in the amount of income taxed by or allocated to the various jurisdictions in which we operate that have differing statutory tax rates; changing tax laws, regulations and interpretations of such tax laws in multiple jurisdictions; and the resolution of issues arising from tax audits or examinations and any related interest or penalties.
The determination of our provision for income taxes and other tax liabilities requires estimation, judgment and calculations where the ultimate tax determination may not be certain. Our determination of tax liability is always subject to review or examination by authorities in various jurisdictions. If a tax authority in any jurisdiction reviews any of our tax returns and proposes an adjustment, including, but not limited to, a determination that the transfer prices and terms we have applied are not appropriate, such an adjustment could have a negative impact on our business.
The ongoing effects of the U.S. Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (“U.S. Tax Act”) and the refinement of provisional estimates could make our results difficult to predict.
Our effective tax rate may fluctuate in the future as a result of the U.S. Tax Act, which was enacted on December 22, 2017. The U.S. Tax Act introduces significant changes to U.S. income tax law that will have a meaningful impact on our provision for income taxes. Accounting for the income tax effects of the U.S. Tax Act requires significant judgments and estimates in the interpretation and calculations of the provisions of the U.S. Tax Act.
Due to the timing of the enactment and the complexity involved in applying the provisions of the U.S. Tax Act, we made reasonable estimates of the effects and recorded provisional amounts in our financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2017. The U.S. Treasury Department, the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”), and other standard-setting bodies may issue guidance on how the provisions of the U.S. Tax Act will be applied or otherwise administered that is different from our interpretation. As we collect and prepare necessary data, and interpret the U.S. Tax Act and any additional guidance issued by the IRS or other standard-setting bodies, we may make adjustments to the provisional amounts that could materially affect our financial position and results of operations as well as our effective tax rate in the period in which the adjustments are made.
Our operating results may be negatively impacted by the loss of certain tax benefits provided by the governments of Belarus and other countries to companies in our industry.
Our subsidiary in Belarus is a member of the Belarus Hi-Tech Park, in which member technology companies are 100% exempt from Belarusian income tax (which as of the date of this annual report was 18%) and from the value added tax until 2049 and taxed at other reduced rates on a variety of other taxes. Our subsidiary in Russia benefits from a substantially reduced rate on social contributions and an exemption on value added tax in certain circumstances, which is a benefit to qualified IT companies in Russia. If these tax benefits are changed, terminated, not extended or comparable new tax incentives are not introduced, we expect that our effective income tax rate and/or our operating expenses would increase significantly, which could materially adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations. See “Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations — Provision for Income Taxes.”
There may be adverse tax and employment law consequences if the independent contractor status of some of our personnel or the exempt status of our employees is successfully challenged.
Certain of our personnel are retained as independent contractors in several countries. The criteria to determine whether an individual is considered an independent contractor or an employee are typically fact sensitive and vary by jurisdiction, as can the interpretation of the applicable laws. If a government authority or court makes any adverse determination with respect to some or all of our independent contractors, we could incur significant costs, including for prior periods, in respect of tax withholding, social security taxes or payments, workers’ compensation and unemployment contributions, and recordkeeping, or we may be required to modify our business model, any of which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, we classify our U.S. employees as “exempt” or “non-exempt” under the Federal Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”), and the FLSA criteria for these classifications are subject to change from time to time. If it were determined that any of our U.S. employees should be classified as “non-exempt” under the FLSA, we may incur costs and liabilities for back wages, unpaid overtime, fines or penalties and/or be subject to employee litigation.
Our insurance coverage may be inadequate to protect us against losses.
Although we maintain some insurance coverage, including professional liability insurance, property insurance coverage for certain of our facilities and equipment and business interruption insurance coverage for certain of our operations, we do not insure for all risks in our operations. If any claims for injury are brought against us, or if we experience any business disruption, litigation or natural disaster, we might incur substantial costs and diversion of resources.
Most of the agreements we have entered into with our clients require us to purchase and maintain specified insurance coverage during the terms of the agreements, including commercial general insurance or public liability insurance, umbrella insurance, product liability insurance, and workers’ compensation insurance. Some of these types of insurance are not available on reasonable terms or at all in some countries in which we operate.
The banking and financial systems in less developed markets where we hold funds remain less developed than those in some more developed markets, and a banking crisis could place liquidity constraints on our business and materially adversely affect our business and financial condition.
Banking and other financial systems in the CIS are less developed and regulated than in some more developed markets, and legislation relating to banks and bank accounts is subject to varying interpretations and inconsistent application. Banks in the CIS generally do not meet the banking standards of more developed markets, and the transparency of the banking sector lags behind international standards. Furthermore, in Russia, Belarus and other CIS countries, bank deposits made by corporate entities generally are not insured. As a result, the banking sector remains subject to periodic instability. A banking crisis, or the bankruptcy or insolvency of banks through which we receive or with which we hold funds, particularly in Belarus, may result in the loss of our deposits or adversely affect our ability to complete banking transactions in that region, which could materially adversely affect our business and financial condition.
Our business could be negatively affected if we incur legal liability, including with respect to our indemnification obligations, in connection with providing our solutions and services.
If we fail to meet our contractual obligations or otherwise breach obligations to our clients, we could be subject to legal liability. If we cannot or do not perform our obligations, we could face legal liability and our contracts might not always protect us adequately through limitations on the scope and/or amount of our potential liability. As a result, we might face significant legal liability and payment obligations, and our financial condition and results of operations could be materially adversely affected.
We may not be able to prevent unauthorized use of our intellectual property, and our intellectual property rights may not be adequate to protect our business and competitive position.
We rely on a combination of copyright, trademark, unfair competition and trade secret laws, as well as intellectual property assignment and confidentiality agreements and other methods to protect our intellectual property rights. Protection of intellectual property rights and confidentiality in some countries in which we operate may not be as effective as that in the United States or other countries with more mature legal systems.
We require our employees and independent contractors to enter into written agreements with us upon the commencement of their relationship with us, which assign to EPAM all intellectual property and work product made, developed or conceived by them in connection with their employment or engagement with us. These agreements also provide that any confidential or proprietary information disclosed or otherwise made available by us be kept confidential. We also enter into confidentiality and non-disclosure agreements with our clients and certain vendors; however, these
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greements may not fully protect our trade secrets, know-how or other proprietary information in the event of any unauthorized use, misappropriation or disclosure. Reverse engineering, unauthorized copying or other misappropriation of our and our clients’ proprietary technologies, tools and applications could enable third parties to benefit from our or our clients’ technologies, tools and applications without paying us for doing so, and our clients may hold us liable for that act and seek damages and compensation from us, which could harm our business and competitive position.
We rely on our trademarks, trade names, service marks and brand names to distinguish our services and solutions from the services of our competitors, and have registered or applied to register many of these trademarks. Third parties may oppose our trademark applications, or otherwise challenge our use of our trademarks. In the event that our trademarks are successfully challenged, we could be forced to rebrand our services and solutions, which could result in loss of brand recognition, and could require us to devote resources to advertising and marketing new brands. Further, we cannot provide assurance that competitors will not infringe our trademarks, or that we will have adequate resources to enforce our trademarks.
We may need to enforce our intellectual property rights through litigation. Litigation relating to our intellectual property may not prove successful and might result in substantial costs and diversion of resources and management attention.
We may face intellectual property infringement claims that could be time-consuming and costly to defend. If we fail to defend ourselves against such claims, we may lose significant intellectual property rights and may be unable to continue providing our existing services.
Our success largely depends on our ability to use and develop our technology, tools, code, methodologies and services without infringing the intellectual property rights of third parties, including patents, copyrights, trade secrets and trademarks. We may be subject to litigation involving claims of patent infringement or violation of other intellectual property rights of third parties.
We typically indemnify clients who purchase our services and solutions against potential infringement of intellectual property rights, which subjects us to the risk of indemnification claims. These claims may require us to initiate or defend protracted and costly litigation on behalf of our clients, regardless of the merits of these claims and are often not subject to liability limits or exclusion of consequential, indirect or punitive damages. If any of these claims succeed, we may be forced to pay damages on behalf of our clients, redesign or cease offering our allegedly infringing services or solutions, or obtain licenses for the intellectual property that such services or solutions allegedly infringe. If we cannot obtain all necessary licenses on commercially reasonable terms, our clients may be forced to stop using our services or solutions.
The holders of patents and other intellectual property rights potentially relevant to our service offerings may make it difficult for us to acquire a license on commercially acceptable terms. In addition, we may be unaware of intellectual property registrations or applications relating to our services that may give rise to potential infringement claims against us. There may also be technologies licensed to and relied on by us that are subject to infringement or other corresponding allegations or claims by third parties, which may damage our ability to rely on such technologies.
Further, our current and former employees and/or subcontractors could challenge our exclusive rights in the software they have developed in the course of their employment. In Russia and certain other countries in which we operate, an employer is deemed to own the copyright in works created by its employees during the course, and within the scope, of their employment, but the employer may be required to satisfy additional legal requirements in order to make further use and dispose of such works. While we believe that we have complied with all such requirements, and have fulfilled all requirements necessary to acquire all rights in software developed by our independent contractors and/or subcontractors, these requirements are often ambiguously defined and enforced. As a result, we cannot assure that we would be successful in defending against any claim by our current or former employees, independent contractors and/or subcontractors challenging our exclusive rights over the use and transfer of works those employees, independent contractors and/or subcontractors created or requesting additional compensation for such works.
Parties making infringement claims may be able to obtain an injunction to prevent us from delivering our services or using technology involving the allegedly infringing intellectual property. Intellectual property litigation is expensive, time-consuming and could divert management’s attention from our business. Protracted litigation could also result in existing or potential clients deferring or limiting their purchase or use of our software product development services or solutions until resolution of such litigation, or could require us to indemnify our clients against infringement claims in certain instances. Any of these actions, regardless of the outcome of litigation or merits of the claim, could damage our reputation and materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.
We are subject to laws and regulations in the United States and other countries in which we operate, including export restrictions, economic sanctions and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, or FCPA, and similar anti-corruption laws. If we are not in compliance with applicable legal requirements, we may be subject to civil or criminal penalties and other remedial measures.
As a company with international operations, we are subject to many laws and regulations restricting our operations, including activities involving restricted countries, organizations, entities and persons that have been identified as unlawful actors or that are subject to U.S. sanctions imposed by the Office of Foreign Assets Control, or OFAC, or other international sanctions that prohibit us from engaging in trade or financial transactions with certain countries, businesses, organizations and individuals. We are subject to the FCPA, which prohibits U.S. companies and their intermediaries from bribing foreign officials for the purpose of obtaining or keeping business or otherwise obtaining favorable treatment, and anti-bribery and anti-corruption laws in other countries. We operate in many parts of the world that have experienced governmental corruption to some degree, and, in certain circumstances, strict compliance with anti-bribery laws may conflict with local customs and practices, although adherence to local customs and practices is generally not a defense under U.S. and other anti-bribery laws.
We have a compliance program with controls and procedures designed to ensure our compliance with the FCPA, OFAC sanctions, and other sanctions, laws and regulations. The continuing implementation and ongoing development and monitoring of such program may be time consuming and expensive, and could result in the discovery of issues or violations with respect to the foregoing by us or our employees, independent contractors, subcontractors or agents of which we were previously unaware.
Any violations of these or other laws, regulations and procedures by our employees, independent contractors, subcontractors and agents could expose us to administrative, civil or criminal penalties, fines or business restrictions, which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations and financial condition and would adversely affect our reputation and the market for shares of our common stock and may require certain of our investors to disclose their investment in our company under certain state laws.
Changes in the European regulatory environment regarding privacy and data protection regulations could expose us to risks of noncompliance and costs associated with compliance
In Europe, we are subject to the 1995 European Union Directive on Data Protection (“1995 Data Protection Directive”), which requires European Union member states to impose minimum restrictions on the collection and use of personal data that, in some respects, are more stringent, and impose more significant burdens on subject businesses, than current privacy standards in the United States. We may also face audits or investigations by one or more foreign government agencies relating to our compliance with these regulations that could result in the imposition of penalties or fines. The European Union member state regulations establish several obligations that organizations must follow with respect to use of personal data, including a prohibition on the transfer of personal information from the European Union to other countries whose laws do not protect personal data to an adequate level of privacy or security. On December 15, 2015, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union reached a political agreement on the future European Union data protection legal framework referred to as the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”), which will replace the 1995 Data Protection Directive. The GDPR will have significant impacts on how businesses can collect and process the personal data of European Union individuals. The GDPR will become effective in May 2018.
The Company is undertaking measures to seek to comply with the GDPR by the effective date. The costs of compliance with, and other burdens imposed by, such laws, regulations and policies that are applicable to us may limit the use and adoption of our products and solutions, alter the way we conduct business and/or could otherwise have a material adverse impact on our results of operations. We may be unsuccessful in establishing legitimate means of transferring data from the European Economic Area, we may experience hesitancy, reluctance, or refusal by European or multi-national customers to continue to use our services due to the potential risk exposure to such customers as a result of the implementation of GDPR, and we and our customers are at risk of enforcement actions taken by the European Union data protection authority until such point in time that we ensure that all data transfers to us from the European Economic Area are legitimized. We may find it necessary to establish systems to maintain EU-origin data in the European Economic Area, which may involve substantial expense and distraction from other aspects of our business. Further, the costs of compliance with, and other burdens imposed by, such laws, regulations and policies that are applicable to us, may limit the use and adoption of our products and solutions and could have a material adverse impact on our results of operations.
Anti-outsourcing legislation and restrictions on immigration, if adopted, may affect our ability to compete for and provide services to clients in the United States or other countries, which could hamper our growth and cause our revenues to decline.
The majority of our employees are nationals of CIS and CEE countries. Some of our projects require a portion of the work to be undertaken at our clients’ facilities, which are sometimes located outside the CIS and CEE. The ability of our employees to work in necessary locations around the world depends on their ability to obtain the required visas and work permits, and this process can be lengthy and difficult. Immigration laws are subject to legislative change, as well as to variations in standards of application and enforcement due to political forces and economic conditions.
In addition, the issue of companies outsourcing services to organizations operating in other countries is a topic of political discussion in many countries, including the United States, which is our largest source of revenues. It is possible that pending legislation in the United States regarding offshore outsourcing may impose restrictions on our ability to deploy employees holding U.S. work visas to client locations, which could adversely impact our business. It is generally difficult to predict the political and economic events that could affect immigration laws, or the restrictive impact they could have on obtaining or maintaining business visas for our employees. However, if enacted, such measures may broaden restrictions on outsourcing by federal and state government agencies and on government contracts with firms that outsource services directly or indirectly, impact private industry with measures such as tax disincentives or intellectual property transfer restrictions, and/or restrict the use of certain work visas.
Our reliance on visas for a number of employees makes us vulnerable to such changes and variations as it affects our ability to staff projects with employees who are not citizens of the country where the work is to be performed. We may not be able to obtain a sufficient number of visas for our employees or we may encounter delays or additional costs in obtaining or maintaining such visas, in which case we may not be able to provide services to our clients on a timely and cost-effective basis or manage our sales and delivery centers as efficiently as we otherwise could, any of which could hamper our growth and cause our revenues to decline.
The 2017, U.S. executive order, “Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States,” restricts entry into the United States of non-U.S. nationals from a number of enumerated countries in the Middle East and suspends a visa interview waiver program that was in place at U.S. consulates worldwide. While the travel restrictions do not extend to nationals of CIS and CEE countries, it is possible that there could be delays in visa processing before CIS and CEE nationals can enter the United States and their wait times for visa interviews may increase significantly. Delays in the process to obtain visas may result in delays in the ability of our personnel to travel to meet with our clients, provide services to our clients or to continue to provide services on a timely basis, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations, financial condition and cash flows.
Similarly, legislation enacted in certain European jurisdictions and any future legislation in European jurisdictions or any other country in which we have clients restricting the performance of services from an offshore location could also materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations. For example, legislation enacted in the United Kingdom, based on the 1977 EC Acquired Rights Directive, has been adopted in some form by many European Union countries. This legislation creates a risk that companies outsourcing their business in whole or in part to an IT services provider effectively give the affected employees of the company or its previous IT services provider, whose positions have been impacted, the right to become employees of the new IT services provider, generally on the same terms and conditions as their original employment. There is also a related risk of unfair dismissal claims arising from dismissals of employees who were employed by the company or the previous IT services provider immediately prior to the outsourcing. This risk could materially affect our ability to obtain new business and provide outsourced services to companies in the United Kingdom and European Union in a cost-effective manner.
Our CIS subsidiaries can be forced into liquidation on the basis of formal noncompliance with certain legal requirements.
We operate in CIS countries primarily through locally organized subsidiaries. Certain provisions of Russian law and the laws of other CIS countries may allow a court to order liquidation of a locally organized legal entity on the basis of its formal noncompliance with certain requirements during formation, reorganization or during its operations. If the company fails to comply with certain requirements including those relating to minimum net assets, governmental or local authorities can seek the involuntary liquidation of such company in court, and the company’s creditors will have the right to accelerate their claims or demand early performance of the company’s obligations as well as demand compensation for any damages. If involuntary liquidation of any of our subsidiaries were to occur, such liquidation could materially adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations.
We may need additional capital, and a failure by us to raise additional capital on terms favorable to us, or at all, could limit our ability to grow our business and develop or enhance our service offerings to respond to market demand or competitive challenges.
We believe that our current cash, cash flow from operations and revolving line of credit are sufficient to meet our anticipated cash needs for at least the next 12 months. We may, however, require additional cash resources due to changed business conditions or other future developments, including any investments or acquisitions we may decide to pursue. If these resources are insufficient to satisfy our cash requirements, we may seek to sell additional equity or debt securities or obtain another credit facility, and we cannot be certain that such additional financing would be available on terms acceptable to us. The sale of additional equity securities could result in dilution to our stockholders, and additional indebtedness would result in increased debt service obligations and could impose operating and financial covenants that would restrict our operations.
Our stock price is volatile.
Our common stock has at times experienced substantial price volatility as a result of variations between our actual and anticipated financial results, announcements by our competitors and us, projections or speculation about our business or that of our competitors by the media or investment analysts or uncertainty about current global economic conditions. The stock market, as a whole, also has experienced price and volume fluctuations that have affected the market price of many technology companies in ways that may have been unrelated to these companies’ operating performance. Furthermore, we believe our stock price should reflect future growth and profitability expectations and, if we fail to meet these expectations, our stock price may significantly decline.
Our liability-classified restricted stock units, which are subject to mark-to-market accounting, and the calculation of weighted-average diluted shares outstanding in accordance with the treasury method are both affected by our stock price. Any fluctuations in the price of our stock will affect our future operating results.
Item 1B. Unresolved Staff Comments
None.
Item 2. Properties
Our headquarters are located in Newtown, Pennsylvania with delivery centers in Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, Hungary, Poland, India, China, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Bulgaria, Armenia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Netherlands, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Hong Kong, Austria, Spain, Ireland and Australia. We have office and building space in more than 47 cities and 25 countries around the world. The majority of our office space is leased under long-term leases with varying expiration dates. We own one office building in Minsk, Belarus with a capacity of
21,669
square meters, which is used by both administrative and IT personnel. Our facilities are used interchangeably among all of our segments. We believe that our existing facilities are adequate to meet our current requirements, and that suitable additional or substitute space will be available, if necessary.
Item 3. Legal Proceedings
From time to time, we are involved in litigation and claims arising out of our operations in the normal course of business. We are not currently a party to any material legal proceeding. In addition, we are not aware of any material legal or governmental proceedings against us, or contemplated to be brought against us.
Item 4. Mine Safety Disclosures
None.