Ansys (NASDAQ: ANSS) announced today that it issued an open letter
to its investors amid the coronavirus disease 2019 (“COVID-19”)
pandemic. The full text of the letter follows:
April 2, 2020
To Our Valued Investors:
It goes without saying that these are extraordinary times. Just
as our hearts go out to everyone affected by COVID-19, we are
enormously grateful to our first responders and medical
professionals who are risking their lives every day to keep us
safe. They are the true heroes of this crisis, and their intrepid
actions are an inspiration to us all.
As always, our first responsibility during these uncertain times
is the health and safety of our employees and their families, our
partners and our broad Ansys community around the world. At the
onset of the crisis, Ansys took action to enable our employees to
work from home as we closed our offices first in China, followed by
other locations around the world. As I write to you now at the end
of March, the improving situation in China has led us to reopen all
our offices there.
In addition to its terrible impact on human life, COVID-19 has
created a tidal wave of disruption affecting nearly every business
in every country around the world. Smaller, less insulated
companies are at risk or have already gone out of business. We are
all moved by the stories of our neighbors and family members who
have lost their jobs as a result of this pandemic. At Ansys though,
we are continuing to pay all our salaried and hourly workers. And
based on today’s circumstances, we are not planning any job
actions.
Over the course of the last 50 years, Ansys has built a
resilient business that helps our customers power their
mission-critical research and development engines. And as
even the most basic products become more complicated, engineering
simulation becomes an imperative during the development
process.
R&D is critical for many companies. Our experience
is that, unlike manufacturing and operations, R&D is the
least impacted by budget cuts and usually the first restored,
primarily because it drives future growth and market
success. This was well illustrated in the financial crisis - a
2009 study by McKinsey and Company, “Upgrading R&D in a
downturn,” showed that companies that heavily invest during an
economic slowdown increase their chances of emerging from the
downturn stronger and more competitive.
Thanks to our recent investments in collaboration technologies
and updated infrastructure, our employees are able to work remotely
in an effective manner. Our direct and indirect sales and support
teams are using this technology to access both Ansys’ data centers
and the public cloud, and to meet virtually with customers to
ensure their needs are being met while working to mitigate
disruptions to our sales pipeline.
Similarly, the vast majority of our customers are also being
forced to work from home – and Ansys is well positioned to support
them in their virtual offices. We have created relaxed licenses
that allow customers to temporarily access Ansys software without
having to rely on bottlenecked virtual private networks. Customers
can also remotely access their corporate data centers – and have
access to burst compute capacity thanks to our native cloud
offerings. We have expanded the cloud capabilities we introduced
last year on Microsoft Azure, enabling customers to test their
product designs remotely.
With the recent expansion of many shelter-in-place regulations,
we have also recently extended the time period for these offers to
enable our customers to continue to use Ansys software remotely.
This expansion is helping customers to continue to take advantage
of Ansys simulation benefits, such as enhanced productivity as well
as faster time to market with reduced development costs.
Thanks to our fiscal discipline, we have a strong balance sheet,
great liquidity as well as access to credit, when and if we need
it. Also, as a reminder, 77% of Ansys’ annual contract value
last year was of a recurring nature, meaning customers continued to
pay for access to our simulation technology and ongoing
enhancements. It is also important to remember that our business is
highly diversified, both from a vertical and a geographical
perspective. Our strength across multiple industries, including
high-technology, aerospace and defense, automotive, industrial
equipment and energy helps to insulate us against a downturn in
specific markets. Similarly, about 40% of our revenue comes from
North America with the rest split roughly evenly between Asia and
Europe.
These are unpredictable times and the extent of the economic
impact of the pandemic is still uncertain. But with the precautions
we are taking for our employees’ health and safety, our investments
in infrastructure and collaboration technologies, special
accommodations for our customers and our continued fiscal
discipline, I believe Ansys is well positioned to help our
customers during this critical time – and well into the future.
When this crisis has abated, I believe that we will emerge in an
even better leadership position to make simulation pervasive across
the product lifecycle.
I am looking forward to sharing our Q1 results with you in early
May.
Thank you for your continued support of Ansys.
Sincerely,
Ajei Gopal President and CEO
Forward-Looking Statements
This letter contains forward-looking statements with the meaning
of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as
amended, including those about employment at Ansys, investments in
research and development and Ansys’s financial and business
performance during and following the pandemic. Factors that could
cause actual results to differ materially from those implied by
these forward-looking statements include: the impact of the
COVID-19 pandemic on Ansys’ business, financial position, results
of operations and liquidity; the effects of government and other
measures seeking to contain its spread; and risks related to an
economic downturn or recession in the United States and in other
countries around the world; as well as other risks described from
time to time in Ansys’s filings with the Securities and Exchange
Commission, including its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year
ended December 31, 2019. Forward-looking statements speak
only as of the date they are made and Ansys undertakes no
obligation to publicly update forward-looking statements, except as
required by law.
About Ansys
If you’ve ever seen a rocket launch, flown on an airplane,
driven a car, used a computer, touched a mobile device, crossed a
bridge or put on wearable technology, chances are you’ve used a
product where Ansys software played a critical role in its
creation. Ansys is the global leader in engineering
simulation. Through our strategy of Pervasive Engineering
Simulation, we help the world’s most innovative companies deliver
radically better products to their customers. By offering the best
and broadest portfolio of engineering simulation software, we help
them solve the most complex design challenges and create products
limited only by imagination. Founded in 1970, Ansys is
headquartered south of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.,
Visit www.ansys.com for more information.
Ansys and any and all ANSYS, Inc. brand, product, service and
feature names, logos and slogans are registered trademarks or
trademarks of ANSYS, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States
or other countries. All other brand, product, service and
feature names or trademarks are the property of their respective
owners.
Contact |
Investors |
Annette Arribas, IRC724.820.3700annette.arribas@ansys.com |
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Media |
Mary Kate Joyce
724.820.4368marykate.joyce@ansys.com |
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