Item 1. Business.
Overview
We are a leading cloud-based provider of human capital management, or HCM, and payroll software solutions that deliver a comprehensive platform for the modern workforce. Our HCM and payroll platform offers an intuitive, easy-to-use product suite that helps businesses attract and retain talent, build culture and connection with their employees, and streamline and automate HR and payroll processes. Excluding clients acquired through acquisitions, as of June 30, 2022, we provided our software-as-a-service, or SaaS, solutions to approximately 33,300 clients across the U.S., which on average had over 100 employees.
Effective management of human capital is a core function in all organizations and requires a significant commitment of resources. Organizations are faced with an ever-changing employment landscape, including numerous federal, state and local regulations across multiple jurisdictions, the complexity of increasingly geographically dispersed employees, and managing hybrid workplaces. At the same time, employees’ expectations are rising, and organizations need to prioritize communication, connection, and collaboration among their employees to differentiate how they attract and retain talent and build a culture of loyalty. Many companies also are operating without the infrastructure, expertise or personnel to implement or support large and complex systems in today’s dynamic environment. Existing solutions offered by third-party payroll service providers can have limited capabilities and configurability while other enterprise-focused software vendors can be prohibitively expensive and time-consuming to implement and manage. We believe that modern organizations are better served by SaaS solutions designed to meet their unique needs, delivering fast time to value, and providing their employees with the most engaging experience available.
Our HCM and payroll software solutions provide the following key benefits to our clients:
•Single & Flexible End-to-End Platform - The foundation of our platform is a single employee system of record that supports the complete employee lifecycle: Talent, Payroll, Core HR, Workforce Management, and Benefits. Our platform centralizes payroll and HCM data, minimizing inconsistent and incomplete information that can be produced when using multiple databases.
•Employee Experience –We embed employee experiences throughout the platform that help employees feel connected to their work whether they are hybrid, remote, on-the-go, or do not have computers or email addresses. Our platform provides tools to communicate, connect to organizations and peers, and focus on career development and growth, which drives engagement and adoption of self-service processes – and drives HR automation and digital transformation.
•Insights & Recommendations – Our clients have access to their data for reporting and compliance needs, but we also provide prescriptive recommendations on how to interpret the data and where to focus next to achieve their goals. Our dashboards use advanced AI to deliver actionable next steps to improve efficiency and build a healthier workforce.
•Leading Customer Service - We supplement our comprehensive software solutions with an integrated implementation and client service organization, all of which are designed to meet the needs of our clients and prospects.
•Seamless Integration with Extensive Ecosystem of Partners. Our software solutions offer our clients automated data integration with hundreds of third-party partner systems, such as 401(k), benefits and insurance provider systems. This integration reduces the complexity and risk of error of manual data transfers and saves time for our clients and their employees. We integrate data with these related systems through a secure connection, which significantly decreases the risk of unauthorized third-party access and other security breaches.
We market and sell our products through our direct sales force. We generate sales leads through a variety of focused marketing initiatives and from our extensive referral network of 401(k) advisors, benefits administrators, insurance brokers, third-party administrators and HR consultants. We derive revenue from a client based on the solutions purchased by the client, the number of client employees and the amount, type and timing of services provided with respect to those client employees. Our annual revenue retention rate was greater than 92% in each of the fiscal years 2020, 2021 and 2022. Our total revenues increased from $561.3 million in fiscal 2020 to $635.6 million in fiscal 2021, representing a 13% year-over-year increase, and to $852.7 million in fiscal 2022, representing a 34% year-over-year increase. Our recurring revenue model and high annual revenue retention rates provide significant visibility into our future operating results.
Our Strategy
We intend to strengthen and extend our position as a leading provider of cloud-based HCM and payroll software solutions. Key elements of our strategy include the following:
•Extend Technological Leadership. We believe that our organically developed cloud-based software solutions, combined with our unified database architecture, enhances the experience and usability of our products, providing what we believe to be a competitive advantage over alternative solutions. Our modern, intuitive user interface utilizes features found in many popular consumer application experiences, enabling users to use our solutions with limited training. We plan to continue our technology innovation, as we have done with our mobile applications, social features and analytics capabilities.
•Grow Our Client Base. We believe that our current client base represents only a small portion of the organizations that could benefit from our solutions. Our clients typically have between 10 to 5,000 employees and while we provide our HCM and payroll software solutions to approximately 33,300 clients across the U.S. (excluding clients acquired through acquisitions) as of June 30, 2022, there are over 1.3 million businesses with 10 to 5,000 employees in the U.S., employing approximately 73 million people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau in 2019. We estimate that if clients were to buy our entire suite of existing solutions at list prices, they would spend approximately $440 per employee annually. We believe our realized target addressable market is approximately $18.6 billion assuming $255 realized per employee per year as our existing clients do not typically own our entire suite of solutions. As we continue to expand our product offerings, we believe that we have an opportunity to increase the amount clients spend on HCM solutions per employee and to expand our addressable market. As we expand our client base and number of employees, we will also grow our sales organization.
•Expand Our Product Offerings. We believe a significant part of our leadership position is the result of our investment and innovation in our product offerings. We plan to continue to invest in product development efforts that will allow us to offer a broader selection of products to new and existing clients.
•Further Develop Our Referral Network. We have developed a strong network of referral participants, such as 401(k) advisors, benefits administrators, insurance brokers, third-party administrators and HR consultants that recommend our solutions and provide referrals. We believe that our platform’s automated data integration with hundreds of related third-party partner systems is valuable to our referral participants, as they are able to access payroll and HR data through a single system which decreases complexity and cost and complements their own product offerings. We plan to increase integration with third-party providers and expand our referral network to grow our client base and lower our client acquisition costs.
Our Products
Our HCM and payroll software solutions deliver a unified platform for the modern workplace. We offer an intuitive, easy-to-use product suite that helps businesses attract and retain talent, build culture and connection with their employees and streamline and automate HR and payroll processes. Our product suite includes the following categories:
Payroll
Payroll and Tax Services – Our Payroll and Tax Services solution is designed to simplify payroll, automate processes and manage complex compliance requirements within one system. Our payroll solution leverages data from our Time and Attendance and Human Capital Management solutions to accurately calculate wages, deductions and withholdings, without the need for manual reentry. Clients work with our experts to configure general ledger integrations, accruals and complex reports to enable data-driven decision making. Our integration capabilities also automatically transfer 401(k) information, retirement plans and benefit files to third-party providers. Through our Tax Services solutions, we accurately prepare and file the necessary tax withholdings and filing documents for local, state and federal jurisdictions.
Global Payroll – Our cloud-based global payroll solution enables U.S.-based companies to manage payroll for employees outside the U.S. in line with complex local and country-specific requirements across many countries. It
also provides consolidated reporting capabilities to efficiently manage a global employee base with real-time access to payroll data.
Expense Management – Our Expense Management solution enables mobile app capture of receipts and imports transactions from credit cards, reducing manual entry errors and minimizing employee and approver paperwork, while also eliminating spreadsheets, calculators and manual approvals through automated workflows that route approved expenses for payroll reimbursement.
On Demand Payment – On Demand Payment provides employees with visibility into their earned wages in between pay cycles based on their hours worked and offers financial flexibility to employees through access to a portion of their earned wages before their scheduled payday without impacting the client’s standard payroll process.
Garnishments – Our Garnishments solution provides the calculation, setup and maintenance of historical deduction records and performs calculation validation against state and federal legislation to mitigate compliance risk and prevent costly penalties and errors.
Human Capital Management
Core HR – Our Human Capital Management solutions streamline HR processes using modern, mobile-enabled tools that help save time by automating administrative tasks and providing data-driven reporting. Clients can track headcount and status for positions, manage position and manager changes, manage compliance tracking and reporting and employee data and documents in one central location.
Employee Self-Service – Our Employee Self-Service module provides employees with access to their information 24/7, which allows them to view checks, request time off, clock in and out, update personal data and collaborate with teammates. Employees can also enroll in benefits, view coverage, access Learning Management System training or view course completion status on-the-go via our mobile app.
Document Library – Our Document Library serves as a central location to securely store personal employee files such as offer letters and performance reviews to help clients stay compliant and organized by replacing manual processes and paper files. HR professionals can search electronic documents and easily upload, store and download documents while managing access with our role-based permission settings.
Compliance Dashboard – With our Compliance Dashboard, clients save time and money by staying up to date with new laws and regulations related to topics such as employment verification, Equal Employment Opportunity and compensation.
HR Edge – HR Edge supports human resource leaders’ navigation through complex compliance requirements, social issues and HR policies. Clients can also access a comprehensive library of detailed articles, guides and other resources to make informed decisions on compliance topics such as healthcare reform, wages and hours regulations, employee leave, state laws, discrimination and more.
Workforce Management
Time and Attendance – Our Time and Attendance solution accurately tracks time and attendance data, eliminating the need for manual tracking of accruals and reducing administrative tasks. Employees can request and manage time off, edit timecards and manage schedule changes. A customizable supervisor dashboard provides at-a-glance visibility to missed punches, pending time off requests, attendance exceptions and more.
Scheduling – Clients can automate schedule tracking by creating and adjusting work schedules as needed, including leveraging templates and building policies based on duration, time between shifts and availability without having to manually correct payroll data. Managers and employees can easily manage their schedules from our mobile app to ensure the appropriate shift coverage.
Time Collection – Our wide variety of time collection devices include kiosks, state-of-the-art time clocks, and mobile and web applications to meet unique needs of different companies while enabling employees to clock in
wherever business is conducted. Advanced features include specifying geographic parameters for mobile punch-in, requiring employees to punch in with a photo, answering attestation prompts and temperature checks.
Talent
Recruiting – Recruiting helps clients find the right candidates by offering intuitive tools to streamline talent acquisition processes from application creation to candidate acceptance. By modernizing the experience, clients can conveniently reach candidates wherever they are, including through embedded text messaging, and instantly track conversations in our platform. HR professionals can customize job applications and reach more candidates by automatically posting to online job portals. To promote an inclusive culture, clients can activate masking of certain candidate details to promote recruiting without bias, while still collecting all essential details, including diversity information. Additionally, our solution provides clients with the ability to auto-fill and simplify background checks, maintain and track personal and confidential data, and have real-time access to candidate information to enable timely staffing decisions. Recruiters can communicate with modern candidates in the ways they expect, including email and text messaging from right within our platform.
Onboarding – Onboarding enables new employees to complete all pre-hire tasks through digital data collection to gather important personal and confidential information and documentation right through our platform. Clients can streamline processes such as handbook acknowledgment, tax withholding forms, I-9 document verification, E-Verify and many others. Additionally, new hires feel an instant connection to their team and employer with welcome notes from leaders, introductory videos, company culture information and company policies.
Learning Management – Our Learning Management solution (LMS) allows clients to easily assign courses tailored to training their employees on new skills, policies, products, and other topics with a variety of course delivery methods including on-demand and webinars, all of which are available via our mobile app. Our clients can create a variety of content for their employees including via a Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM), embedded video and various document types. The client’s custom content is supplemented by a library of standard trainings provided by Paylocity to help in areas like anti-harassment, new hire, workplace safety, diversity in recruiting and many more. Clients can also empower their employees to create trainings so that internal subject matter experts can share their expertise with colleagues. LMS also offers numerous diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility courses, modules, and instructional kits to help ensure employees are educated to support a diverse workforce.
Performance Management – Our Performance Management tools enable transparent, two-way communication, allowing teams to have ongoing performance conversations. With the ability to manage employee review cycles at the center of the performance management solution, employees can also manage goals and track their career development. Our tools help facilitate ongoing, goals-driven conversations using Journals, giving employees a record of their tasks, goals and accomplishments. Additionally, our clients can prepare succession planning assessments across their employee population by using our 9-box tool that provides context to employees’ performance and the ability to visualize the distribution of their workforce.
Compensation Management – Compensation Management helps clients ensure alignment between organizational goals, budgets and participant eligibility in an efficient process that reduces manual effort and paper-based budgeting activities. Our customized dashboards provide visibility to individual performance and compensation history at custom permission levels and the full value of an employee’s compensation and benefits. Clients can create employee-facing Total Rewards Statements in bulk to demonstrate the full compensation an employee receives—including not just pay, but also benefits, time off, and more.
Benefits
Employee Benefits Management – Clients can plan and administer competitive benefits packages in one place while offering a smooth, mobile-friendly enrollment and management experience for employees with our Employee Benefits Management tool. Benefit administrators can add enrollment rules, manage benefit offerings for different employee groups, customize user plan limits, and view plan documentation, among other features. Employees can manage their own elections in Employee Self Service or via the mobile app, access open
enrollment, account balances and more. Clients can also use embedded experiences like notifications and training to help employees easily stay apprised of important dates and understand the benefit options available to them.
Third-Party Administrative (TPA) Solutions – Our TPA solutions are designed to modernize the administration of HSA, FSA, Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA), Transportation Management Account (TMA) and Premium Only Plan (POP) benefits by providing users with a single, unified access point for payroll, HR, and benefits administration. Our TPA solutions include mobile and web access, allowing users to view transaction details and account balances while having the ability to submit claims from our integrated employee portal. It also eases the administration of COBRA coverage and retiree billing.
Employee Experiences
Community – Community is an integrated part of our platform that streamlines communication and fosters a culture of engagement not possible with broadcast emails, antiquated intranets or break room bulletin boards. It empowers clients to engage all employees—even those that are remote, on-the-go or do not have corporate email, which is more critical than ever in the new hybrid world of work. With Community, clients can optimize “broadcast” communications with a company feed that streamlines announcements into a single location. Announcements can be managed, sent and tracked with an intuitive dashboard. Clients can support their employees at scale with Ask an Expert groups where employees can pose questions to designated group experts who manage questions from a dashboard. Community also offers premium capabilities such as one-to-one and one-to many chat functionality to improve real-time communication; the ability to upload, create, edit, and share files; the automatic creation of team groups for supervisors and direct reports; updated user profiles allowing employees to list interests, team members, education, skills or hobbies and enhanced directory and search capability to easily find, follow and engage with co-workers.
Premium Video – Premium Video provides clients the ability to record, upload and embed videos across our HCM platform to increase collaboration, morale, engagement and productivity. Clients can embed videos seamlessly into tasks that are critical to their business such as leadership announcements, job postings, onboarding, performance journals, surveys and more.
Surveys – Our Surveys tool help clients gather valuable employee feedback to encourage ongoing and transparent conversations while staying in touch with their workforce.
Peer Recognition – Peer Recognition promotes positive interactions by allowing employees to recognize and celebrate colleagues’ achievements. It also gives employees the ability to post accolades on their profiles and share with co-workers.
Insights & Recommendations
Modern Workforce Index – Leveraging data from more than 33,000 clients, our patent-pending Modern Workforce Index (MWI) puts sophisticated AI into an HR intelligence dashboard that gives clients insight into employee sentiment, performance metrics, and engagement. With MWI, clients can identify gaps and get smart, actionable recommendations on how to improve their organization’s health by increasing employee productivity and reducing turnover.
Data Insights – With our Data Insights solution, our clients can evaluate the health of their organizations with actionable insights in areas such as headcount, turnover, labor costs and composition of their employee populations so they can customize, fund and deploy strategies to support diverse employees and identify needs of underrepresented groups.
Reporting – Clients can build and customize reports within our platform. We also offer hundreds of standard reports that clients can use as is or adjust to suit their needs. New reports are added regularly in response to regulatory changes, compliance updates and client feedback.
Client Support Teams
We supplement our comprehensive software platform with an integrated implementation and client service organization with deep subject matter expertise. Our core operation consists of various specialists, including
implementation teams, account managers, payroll processing and tax service teams. Delivering a positive experience and a high level of support is an essential element of our ability to sell our solutions and retain clients.
Implementation and Training Services
Our clients are typically either migrating to our platform from a competitive solution or are adopting their first online HCM and payroll solution. These organizations often have limited internal resources and rely on us to implement their HCM and payroll solutions. We typically implement our product suite within one to eight weeks, depending on the size and complexity of each client. Each client is guided through the implementation process by our knowledgeable consultants for all implementation matters. We believe our ability to rapidly implement our solutions is principally due to the combination of our emphasis on engagement with the client, our standardized methodology, our cloud-based architecture and our highly configurable, easy-to-use products.
We offer clients the opportunity to utilize on-demand or in-class training designed to provide clients with general knowledge on our solutions. We also host an annual client conference for clients to learn about new products and features and allow clients to provide feedback and learn best practices.
Client Service
Our client service model is designed to serve and support the needs of our clients and to build loyalty by developing strong relationships with clients. We strive to achieve high revenue retention, in part, by delivering high-quality service. Our revenue retention was greater than 92% in each of fiscal 2020, 2021 and 2022. Each client is assigned an account management team that serves as the central point of contact for any questions or support needs. We believe this approach enhances client service by providing clients with knowledgeable resources who understand the client’s business, respond quickly, and are accountable for the overall client experience. Account managers are supplemented by teams with deep technical and subject matter expertise who help to expediently and effectively address client needs. We also proactively solicit client feedback through ongoing surveys from which we receive actionable feedback that we use to enhance our client service processes. We have also built an online knowledge repository for clients that provide industry content and Paylocity product and service information.
Tax and Regulatory Services
Our software contains a rules engine designed to make accurate federal, state, and local tax calculations that is continually updated to support all pertinent legislative changes across U.S. jurisdictions with the support of our tax compliance professionals. Our tax service teams provide a variety of solutions to clients including processing payroll tax deposits, preparing and filing quarterly and annual employment tax returns and amendments and resolving client employment tax notices. Our tax filing and compliance departments perform multiple audits to ensure that clients remit timely and accurate tax payments. In addition, a series of audit routines are run to ensure that quarterly tax filings are accurate and submitted on a timely basis.
Clients
Excluding clients acquired through acquisitions, as of June 30, 2022, we provided our HCM and payroll software solutions to approximately 33,300 clients, across the U.S. The rate at which we add clients is variable period-to-period and is also seasonal as many clients switch solutions during the first calendar quarter of each year. Clients include for-profit and non-profit organizations across industries including business services, financial services, healthcare, manufacturing, restaurants, retail, technology and others. For each of the three years ended June 30, 2020, 2021 and 2022, no client accounted for more than 1% of our revenues.
Sales and Marketing
We market and sell our products and services through our direct sales force. Our direct sales force includes sales representatives who have defined geographic territories throughout the U.S. We seek to hire experienced sales representatives wherever they are located and believe we have room to grow the number of sales representatives in each of our territories.
The sales cycle begins with a sales lead generated by the sales representative, through our third-party referral network, a client referral, our telemarketing team, our external website, marketing lead generation strategies or other
territory-based activities. We support our sales force with a marketing program that includes seminars and webinars, email marketing, social media marketing, broker events and web marketing.
Referral Network
As a core element of our business strategy, we have developed a referral network of third-party service providers, including 401(k) advisors, benefits administrators, insurance brokers, third-party administrators and HR consultants, that recommend our solutions and provide referrals. Our referral network has become an increasingly important component of our sales process, and in fiscal 2022, more than 25% of our new client revenue originated by referrals from participants in our referral network.
We believe participants in our referral network refer potential clients to us because of the strength of our products and services, the value we provide our referral partners through our broker portal, the fact that we do not provide services that compete with our referral networks, and because we offer third parties the ability to integrate their systems with our platform. Unlike other HCM and payroll solution providers who also provide retirement plans, health insurance and other products and services competitive with the offerings of the participants in our referral network, we focus only on our core business of providing HCM and payroll solutions. In some cases, we have formalized relationships in which we are a recommended vendor of these participants. In other cases, the relationships are informal. We typically do not compensate these participants for referrals.
Partner Ecosystem
We have developed a partner ecosystem of third-party systems, such as 401(k), benefits and insurance provider systems, with whom we provide automated data integration for their clients. These third-party providers require certain financial, payroll and other employee demographic information from their clients to efficiently provide their respective services. After securing authorization from the client, we exchange data with these providers. In turn, these third-party providers supply data to us, which allows us to deliver comprehensive HR and benefit management services to our clients. We believe our partnerships with these third parties are an important part of their service offerings. We have also developed our solutions to integrate with a variety of other systems used by our clients, such as accounting, point of sale, banking, expense management, recruiting, background screening and skills assessment solutions.
Paylocity’s automated data integration reduces the complexity and risk of error of manual data transfers and saves clients and employees time. Direct and automated data transmission improves the accuracy of data and facilitates data collection in partners’ systems. Having automated data integration with a HCM and payroll provider differentiates partners’ product offerings, strengthening their competitive positioning in their own markets.
Technology
We offer our solutions on a cloud-based platform that leverages a unified architecture and a common code base that we organically developed. Clients do not need to install our software in their data centers and can access our solutions through any mobile device or web browser with Internet access.
•Multi-Tenant Architecture. Our software solutions were designed with a multi-tenant architecture. This architecture gives us an advantage over many disparate traditional systems, which are less flexible and require longer and more costly development and upgrade cycles.
•Mobile Focused. We employ mobile-centric principles in our solution design and development. We believe that the increasing mobility of employees heightens the importance of access to our solutions through mobile devices, including smart phones and tablets. Our mobile experience provides our clients and their employees with access to our solutions through virtually any device having Internet access. We bring the flexibility of a secure, cloud-based solution to users without the need to access a traditional desktop or laptop computer.
•Security. We maintain comprehensive security programs designed to ensure the security and integrity of client and employee data, protect against security threats or data breaches and prevent unauthorized access. We regulate and limit all access to servers and networks at our data centers. Our systems are monitored for irregular or suspicious activity, and we have dedicated internal staff perform security
assessments for each release. Our systems undergo regular penetration testing and source code reviews by an independent third-party security firm.
We use multiple cloud hosting and third-party data center providers to host our solutions, including data centers in Franklin Park, Illinois and Kenosha, Wisconsin (for backup and disaster recovery). We supply the hardware infrastructure and are responsible for the ongoing maintenance of our equipment at all data center locations.
Competition
The market for HCM and payroll solutions is both fragmented and highly competitive. Our competitors vary for each of our solutions and primarily include payroll and HR service and software providers, such as Automatic Data Processing, Inc., Paychex, Inc., Paycom Software, Inc., Paycor, Inc., Ultimate Kronos Group and other local and regional providers.
We believe the principal competitive factors on which we compete in our market include the following:
•Solutions built to connect with today’s modern workforce;
•Comprehensive HCM and payroll product suite on a single platform;
•Breadth and depth of product functionality;
•Configurability and ease of use of our solutions;
•Modern, mobile, intuitive and consumer-oriented user experience;
•Benefits of a cloud-based technology platform;
•Ability to innovate and respond to client needs rapidly;
•Domain expertise in HCM and payroll;
•Quality of implementation and client service;
•Ease of implementation;
•Real-time web-based payroll processing; and
•Access to a wide variety of complementary third-party service providers.
We believe that we compete favorably on these factors and our ability to remain competitive will largely depend on the success of our continued investment in sales and marketing, research and development and implementation and client services.
Research and Development
We invest heavily in research and development to continuously introduce new modules, technologies, features and functionality. We are organized in small product-centric teams that utilize an agile development methodology. We focus our efforts on developing new modules and core technologies and on further enhancing the usability, functionality, reliability, performance and flexibility of existing modules.
Research and development costs, including research and development costs that were capitalized, were $91.0 million, $108.5 million and $145.1 million for the years ended June 30, 2020, 2021 and 2022, respectively.
Intellectual Property
Our success is dependent, in part, on our ability to protect our proprietary technology and other intellectual property rights. We rely on a combination of trade secrets, copyrights and trademarks, as well as contractual protections to
establish and protect our intellectual property rights. We require our employees, consultants and other third parties to enter into confidentiality and proprietary rights agreements and control access to software, documentation and other proprietary information. Although we rely on laws respecting intellectual property rights, including trade secret, copyright and trademark laws, as well as contractual protections to establish and protect our intellectual property rights, we believe that factors such as the technological and creative skills of our personnel, creation of new modules, features and functionality and frequent enhancements to our modules are more essential to establishing and maintaining our technology leadership position.
Governmental Regulation
As a provider of HCM and payroll solutions, our systems contain a significant amount of sensitive data related to clients, employees of our clients, business partners and our employees. Data privacy has become a significant issue for organizations globally, including those in the United States. The regulatory framework for privacy issues worldwide is rapidly evolving and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. Many national, state and local government bodies have adopted or are considering adopting laws and regulations related to the collection, use and disclosure of personal information. In the United States, these include rules and regulations promulgated under the authority of the Federal Trade Commission, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”), state breach notification laws, and state privacy laws, such as the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (“CCPA”), the California Privacy Rights Act of 2020 (“CPRA”) and the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”). Further, because some of our clients have international operations, the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) and other foreign data privacy laws may impact our processing of certain client and employee information.
In addition, many of our solutions are designed to assist clients with their compliance with certain U.S. federal, state and local laws and regulations that apply to them. As such, our products and services may become subject to increasing and/or changing regulatory requirements, including changes in tax, benefit and other laws, and as these requirements proliferate, we may be required to change or adapt our products and services to comply. Changing regulatory requirements might reduce or eliminate the need for some of our products and services, block us from developing new products and services or have an adverse effect on the functionality and acceptance of our solution. This might in turn impose additional costs upon us to comply, modify or further develop our products and services. It might also make introduction of new products and services more costly or more time-consuming than we currently anticipate or prevent introduction of such new products and services. For example, the adoption of new money transmitter or money services business statutes in jurisdictions or changes in regulators’ interpretation of existing state and federal money transmitter or money services business statutes or regulations, could subject us to registration or licensing or limit business activities until we are appropriately licensed.
Our ability to comply with and address the continuously evolving requirements and regulations applicable to our business depends on a variety of factors, including the functionality and design of our solutions and the manner in which our clients and their employees utilize them. We have implemented operating policies and procedures to protect the accuracy, privacy and security of our clients’ and their employees’ information and voluntarily undergo certain periodic audits and examinations and maintain certain certifications to demonstrate our commitment to regulatory compliance.
The foregoing description does not include an exhaustive list of the laws and regulations governing or impacting our business. See the discussion contained in the “Risk Factors” section in Part I, Item 1A of this Annual Report on Form 10-K for information regarding changes in laws and regulations that could have a materially adverse effect on our business, operating results or financial condition.
Human Capital
As a leading provider of cloud-based HCM and payroll software solutions, we are committed to delivering the most modern suite of solutions that drive employee engagement and a more connected culture for both our clients and our employees. Our Co-CEOs, together with our senior executive team and Board of Directors, drive our human capital strategy including key initiatives related to our employees and company culture.
For additional information regarding our human capital initiatives, we encourage investors and other users of this Annual Report on Form 10-K to visit our Corporate Social Responsibility website at https://www.paylocity.com/who-we-are/about-us/corporate-responsibility/. The information contained on this website is not incorporated by reference into this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
As of June 30, 2022, our workforce consisted of approximately 5,300 employees, substantially all of which were employed on a full-time basis in the United States.
Culture & Engagement
At Paylocity, we strive to be an organization where every employee has a voice, feels welcomed and is empowered to do their best work. Our core values drive our culture – we believe in earning it every day, that growth fuels opportunity, thinking next generation, living the reputation, and being unbeatable together. Our core values serve as the foundation from which we create an engaging culture for our employees, how we train and develop our teams and how we identify the right talent for our organization. Our approach to drive a strong culture and employee engagement has been validated externally as Paylocity has been named Forbes 2022 Best Employers for Diversity, Forbes 2022 America’s Best Mid-Size Employers and was also certified Great Place To Work on multiple occasions.
We support a number of employee resource groups (“ERGs”) including PCTY Equality, which focuses on fostering a positive work environment and providing support for employees and allies of the LGBTQIA+ community, our PCTY OneWorld group, which fosters an inclusive work environment and provides support for our employees of diverse ethnic backgrounds, PCTY Sheroes, which supports and celebrates women, PCTY Sustainability, whereby our employees support initiatives to operate our business and facilities to conserve energy, water and raw materials, and new this year, our PCTY Mental Health, which promotes a psychologically safe and healthy workplace where employees bring their whole selves to work and their mental well-being is supported. Each of these groups are organized to give employees the chance to build community and connections, voice their ideas and perspectives, personally develop and grow, and shape our culture to make a difference at work and in our local communities.
Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility
Dedication to diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility (“DEIA”) is foundational to our culture. Led by our Chief Diversity Officer and Diversity Leadership Council, we remain committed to increasing the representation of minority groups within our organization, including in leadership roles, and we directly focus on these goals within our talent acquisition and employee development efforts. Our focus includes attracting diverse candidates to our organization while also investing in professional development and mentorship programs focused on underrepresented employee groups.
As of June 30, 2022, approximately 51% of our employees identified as female and 36% of our employees were made up of underrepresented minorities. As of June 30, 2022, approximately 44% of director roles and above were held by a female and 28% of our director roles and above were held by underrepresented minorities. The tables below provide metrics regarding the composition of our workforce as of June 30, 2022.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | Overall Workforce |
| Ethnicity | | All | | Female | | Male | | *Undisclosed |
| White | | 64.1% | | 48.5% | | 51.5% | | —% |
| Asian & Indian | | 6.1% | | 49.4% | | 50.6% | | —% |
| Hispanic & Latinx | | 11.6% | | 56.2% | | 43.6% | | 0.2% |
| Black or African American | | 10.0% | | 66.0% | | 34.0% | | —% |
| Multiracial | | 4.0% | | 58.7% | | 41.3% | | —% |
| Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander | | 0.3% | | 62.5% | | 37.5% | | —% |
| American Indian or Alaskan Native | | 0.3% | | 53.3% | | 46.7% | | —% |
| Undisclosed* | | 3.6% | | 36.7% | | 49.7% | | 13.6% |
| Overall | | 100.0% | | 51.2% | | 48.3% | | 0.5% |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | Leadership** |
| Ethnicity | | All | | Female | | Male | | *Undisclosed |
| White | | 72.3% | | 45.1% | | 54.9% | | —% |
| Asian & Indian | | 17.0% | | 37.5% | | 62.5% | | —% |
| Hispanic & Latinx | | 2.8% | | 50.0% | | 50.0% | | —% |
| Black or African American | | 3.5% | | 60.0% | | 40.0% | | —% |
| Multiracial | | 2.2% | | 33.3% | | 66.7% | | —% |
| Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander | | —% | | —% | | —% | | —% |
| American Indian or Alaskan Native | | —% | | —% | | —% | | —% |
| Undisclosed* | | 2.2% | | 33.3% | | 66.7% | | —% |
| Overall | | 100.0% | | 44.0% | | 56.0% | | —% |
* Individuals preferred to not disclose an ethnicity and/or gender
** Defined as individuals in director-level positions and above
To support our DEIA efforts, we launched a curriculum of learning and training content known as “BRIDGE” (Belonging, Respect, Inclusion, Diversity, Generosity, and Equity), that delivers training content related to topics such as unconscious bias, inclusive leadership and building diverse teams. Our curriculum is designed with the needs of both our employees and clients in mind, with content widely available via our Learning Management System.
We also strive to cultivate the most inclusive workplace culture possible. To deliver on this commitment, we launched our second annual “Get Counted” self-ID campaign which allows employees to self-identify in areas such as disability, race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, veteran status, sexual orientation, and personal pronouns. This data provides an accurate view of our diverse workforce so we can better customize, fund, and initiate specialized programming, accommodations and strategies.
Learning & Development
As a 2022 Association for Talent Development 100 Best Training organization, we are committed to creating industry leading talent development and leadership programs that support the professional growth of our employees. In addition to other programs throughout our organization, we provide our operations team with an immersive scenario-based training program and our salesforce with an intensive learning experience on our go-to-market sales strategy and process. Through our internally developed Learning Management System (“LMS”) with Video Premium, we enable employees to share knowledge through self-recorded sessions, which complements our library consisting of hundreds of internal courses. We continue to invest in our employees by providing development opportunities through our Leader of Others program, which is designed to help prepare new leaders to guide their team to high performance. This leadership program, combined with our strong culture, increasingly results in our employees stepping into larger roles within the organization evidenced by 53% of new leadership roles being filled internally during fiscal 2022.
Talent Acquisition & Compensation
We focus diligently on attracting a diverse pool of talented candidates that can help us achieve our short and long-term goals as an organization. Our philosophy of “talent anywhere” focuses on identifying the right individuals for our business, regardless of where they are located geographically. For Paylocity, the right talent is someone who embodies our values, has an innate curiosity to learn and grow with our business, and has a diverse perspective on how best to accomplish our goals. We have embraced flexible working arrangements which we believe are essential to enable our employees to work in the environment that best suits their needs.
Our compensation approach is centered around a philosophy that allows us to compete for and retain the right talent to grow our organization, while being consistent and equitable. Our total rewards program includes competitive pay, an employee stock purchase program, the ability to receive a portion of earned wages before the end of the payroll cycle through our On-Demand Payment product, market competitive retirement benefits, paid time off, the ability to consolidate and refinance federal and private student loans, interest free employee loans and many other benefits. Retaining talent is key to our compensation strategy, therefore we have expanded our restricted stock program to cover more than half of our
employee base. We partner with best-in-class organizations to ensure that we utilize the most current data to serve as a foundation of our compensation strategy.
We are also committed to supporting the health and well-being of our employees and offer a multitude of resources to assist in these efforts. In addition to traditional benefit offerings, we provide all employees with innovative perks and benefits, such as flexible work schedules, paid parental leave, adoption assistance, health advocacy services, paid time off to volunteer, tuition reimbursement and many others. We are also very proud to offer a benefits package that is certified by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health.
PCTY Gives
Giving back to our local communities takes many forms at Paylocity. Through PCTY Gives, we mobilize our technology, people and resources across the country through in-kind donations, our Elevate Your Passions (“EYP”) Grant Program, Volunteers in Action paid time-off, signature program funding, corporate sponsored volunteerism and many other initiatives. To support our employees and their communities, each quarter we donate to qualified 501 (c)(3) charities nominated by our employees through the EYP program. In addition to local charities, Paylocity partners with national organizations such as Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, Blessings in a Backpack, American Red Cross, National Alliance on Mental Illness and Illinois Science and Technology Coalition. To support the children of Paylocity employees, the Peter J. McGrail Scholarship program, named after our late CFO, provides higher education tuition assistance for selected participants.
Available Information
Our Internet address is www.paylocity.com and our investor relations website is located at http://investors.paylocity.com. We make available free of charge on our investor relations website under the heading “Financials” our Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and amendments to those reports as soon as reasonably practicable after such materials are electronically filed with (or furnished to) the SEC. Information contained on our websites is not incorporated by reference into this Annual Report on Form 10-K. In addition, the public may read and copy materials we file with the SEC at the SEC’s Public Reference Room at 100 F Street, NE, Washington, DC 20549. The public may obtain information on the operation of the Public Reference Room by calling the SEC at 1-800-SEC-0330. In addition, the SEC maintains an Internet site, www.sec.gov, that includes filings of and information about issuers that file electronically with the SEC.
Item 1A. Risk Factors.
Our business, prospects, financial condition or operating results could be materially adversely affected by any of these risks, as well as other risks not currently known to us or that are currently considered immaterial. The trading price of our common stock could decline due to any of the risks and uncertainties described below, and you may lose all or part of your investment. In assessing these risks, you should also refer to the other information contained in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, including our consolidated financial statements and related notes.
Risks Related to our Business and Industry
Our quarterly operating results have fluctuated in the past and may continue to fluctuate due to a variety of factors, many of which are outside of our control.
Our number of new clients typically increases more during our third fiscal quarter ending March 31 than during the rest of our fiscal year, primarily because many new clients prefer to start using our human capital management, or HCM, and payroll solutions at the beginning of a calendar year. Client funds and year-end activities are also traditionally higher during our third fiscal quarter. As a result, our total revenue and expenses have historically grown disproportionately during our third fiscal quarter as compared to other quarters. Due to this seasonality in our business, quarter-to-quarter comparisons of our operations are not necessarily meaningful and such comparisons should not be relied upon as indications of future performance. Additionally, fluctuation in quarterly results may negatively impact the price of our common stock.
In addition to other risk factors listed within this “Risk Factors” section of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, some other important factors that may cause fluctuations in our quarterly operating results include the following:
•The extent to which our products achieve or maintain market acceptance;
•Our ability to introduce new products and enhancements and updates to our existing products on a timely basis;
•Competitive pressures and the introduction of enhanced products and services from competitors;
•Changes in client budgets and procurement policies;
•The amount and timing of our investment in research and development activities and whether such investments are capitalized or expensed as incurred;
•The number of our clients’ employees;
•Timing of recognition of revenues and expenses;
•Client renewal rates;
•Seasonality in our business;
•Technical difficulties with our products or interruptions in our services;
•Our ability to hire and retain qualified personnel;
•A repeal of or changes to the laws and regulations related to the products and services which we offer;
•Changes in accounting principles;
•Business disruptions caused by public health issues such as the coronavirus disease (“COVID-19”) pandemic;
•Macroeconomic factors, including changes in interest rates and inflationary pressures; and
•Unforeseen legal expenses, including litigation and settlement costs.
In addition, a significant portion of our operating expenses are related to compensation and other items which are relatively fixed in the short-term, and we plan expenditures based in part on our expectations regarding future needs and opportunities. Accordingly, changes in our business or revenue shortfalls could decrease our gross and operating margins and could negatively impact our operating results from period to period.
If we do not continue to innovate and deliver high-quality, technologically advanced products and services, we will not remain competitive and our revenue and operating results could suffer.
The market for our solutions is characterized by rapid technological advancements, changes in client requirements, frequent new product introductions and enhancements and changing industry standards. The life cycles of our products are difficult to estimate. Rapid technological changes and the introduction of new products and enhancements by new or existing competitors, or development of entirely new technologies to replace existing offerings could limit the demand for our existing or future solutions and undermine our current market position.
Our success depends in substantial part on our continuing ability to provide products and services that organizations will find superior to our competitors’ offerings and will continue to use. We intend to continue to invest significant resources in research and development to enhance our existing products and services and introduce new high-quality products that clients will want. If we are unable to predict user preferences or industry changes, or if we are unable to modify our products and services on a timely basis or to effectively bring new products to market, our revenue and operating results may suffer.
Failure to manage our growth effectively could increase our expenses, decrease our revenue, and prevent us from implementing our business strategy and sustaining our revenue growth rates.
We have and we believe we will continue to experience rapid revenue and client base growth. However, the growth in our number of clients puts significant demands on our business, requires increased capital expenditures and increases our operating expenses. To manage this growth effectively, we must attract, train, and retain a significant number of qualified sales, implementation, client service, software development, information technology and management personnel. We also must maintain and enhance our technology infrastructure and our financial and accounting systems and controls. We must also expand and develop our network of third-party service providers, including 401(k) advisors, benefits administrators, insurance brokers, third-party administrators and HR consultants, which represent a significant source of referrals of potential clients for our products and implementation services. Failure to effectively manage our growth could adversely impact our business and results of operations. We could also suffer operational mistakes, a loss of business opportunities and employee losses. If our management is unable to effectively manage our growth, our expenses might increase more than expected, our revenue could decline or might grow more slowly than expected, and we might be unable to implement our business strategy.
The markets in which we participate are highly competitive, and if we do not compete effectively, our operating results could be adversely affected.
The market for HCM and payroll solutions is fragmented, highly competitive and rapidly changing. Our competitors vary for each of our solutions and primarily include payroll and HR service and software providers, such as Automatic Data Processing, Inc., Paychex, Inc., Paycom Software, Inc., Paycor, Inc., Ultimate Kronos Group and other local and regional providers.
Several of our competitors are larger and have greater name recognition, longer operating histories and significantly greater resources than we do. Many of these competitors are able to devote greater resources to the development, promotion and sale of their products and services. Furthermore, our current or potential competitors may be acquired by third parties with greater available resources and the ability to initiate or withstand substantial price competition, which may include price concessions, delayed payment terms, or other terms and conditions that are more enticing to potential clients. As a result, our competitors may be able to develop products and services better received by our markets or may be able to respond more quickly and effectively than we can to new or changing opportunities, technologies, regulations, or client requirements.
In addition, current and potential competitors have established, and might in the future establish, partner or form other cooperative relationships with vendors of complementary products, technologies or services to enable them to offer new products and services, to compete more effectively or to increase the availability of their products in the marketplace. New competitors or relationships might emerge that have greater market share, a larger client base, more widely adopted proprietary technologies, greater marketing expertise, greater financial resources, and larger sales forces than we have, which could put us at a competitive disadvantage. In light of these advantages, current or potential clients might accept competitive offerings in lieu of purchasing our offerings. We expect competition to continue for these reasons, and such competition could negatively impact our sales, profitability or market share.
If we fail to manage our technical operations infrastructure, including operation of our data centers, our existing clients may experience service outages and our new clients may experience delays in the deployment of our modules.
We have experienced significant growth in the number of users, transactions and data that our operations infrastructure supports. We seek to maintain sufficient excess capacity in our data centers and other operations infrastructure to meet the needs of our clients. We also seek to maintain excess capacity to support new client deployments and the expansion of existing client deployments. In addition, we need to properly manage our technological operations infrastructure in order to support version control, changes in hardware and software parameters and the evolution of our modules. We may experience website disruptions, outages and other performance problems. These problems may be caused by a variety of factors, including infrastructure changes, human or software errors, viruses, security attacks, fraud, spikes in client usage and denial of service issues. In some instances, we may not be able to identify the cause or causes of these performance problems within an acceptable period of time. If we do not accurately predict our infrastructure requirements, our existing clients may experience service outages that may subject us to financial penalties, financial liabilities and client losses. If our operations infrastructure fails to keep pace with increased sales, clients may experience delays as we seek to obtain additional capacity, which could adversely affect our reputation and our revenues.
In addition, our ability to deliver our cloud-based modules depends on the development and maintenance of Internet infrastructure by third parties. This includes maintenance of a reliable network backbone with the necessary speed, data capacity, bandwidth capacity, and security. We may experience future interruptions and delays in services and availability from time to time. Any interruption may affect the availability, accuracy, or timeliness in our services and could damage our reputation, cause our clients to terminate their use of our software, require us to indemnify our clients against certain losses due to our own errors and prevent us from gaining additional business from current or future clients. In the event of a catastrophic event with respect to one or more of our systems, we may experience an extended period of system unavailability, which could negatively impact our relationship with clients. To operate without interruption, both we and our clients must guard against:
•Damage from fire, power loss, natural disasters, pandemics and other force majeure events outside our control;
•Communications failures;
•Software and hardware errors, failures and crashes;
•Security breaches, computer viruses, hacking, worms, malware, ransomware, denial-of-service attacks and similar disruptive problems; and
•Other potential interruptions.
We use multiple cloud hosting and third-party data center providers to host our solutions, including data centers in Franklin Park, Illinois and Kenosha, Wisconsin (for backup and disaster recovery). We also may decide to employ additional offsite data centers in the future to accommodate growth. Problems faced by our data center locations (such as a hardware or other supply chain disruption), with the telecommunications network providers with whom we or they contract, or with the systems by which our telecommunications providers allocate capacity among their clients, including us, could adversely affect the availability and processing of our solutions and related services and the experience of our clients. If our data centers are unable to keep up with our growing needs for capacity, this could have an adverse effect on our business and cause us to incur additional expense. Any changes in service levels at our third-party data center or any errors, defects, disruptions or other performance problems with our modules could adversely affect our reputation and may damage our clients’ stored files or result in lengthy interruptions in our services. Interruptions in our services might reduce our revenues, subject us to potential liability or other expenses or adversely affect our renewal rates.
In addition, while we own, control and have access to our servers and all of the components of our network that are located in our backup data centers, we do not control the operation of these facilities. The operators of our third-party data center facilities have no obligation to renew their agreements with us on commercially reasonable terms, or at all. If we are unable to renew these agreements on commercially reasonable terms, or if the data center operators are acquired, we may be required to transfer our servers and other infrastructure to new data center facilities, and we may incur costs and experience service interruption in doing so.
We typically pay client employees and may pay taxing authorities amounts due for a payroll period before a client’s electronic funds transfers are finally settled to our account. If client payments are rejected by banking institutions or otherwise fail to clear into our accounts, we may require additional sources of short-term liquidity and our operating results could be adversely affected.
Our payroll processing business involves the movement of significant funds from the account of a client to employees and relevant taxing authorities. Though we debit a client’s account prior to any disbursement on its behalf, due to Automated Clearing House, or ACH, banking regulations, funds previously credited could be reversed under certain circumstances and timeframes after our payment of amounts due to employees and taxing and other regulatory authorities. There is therefore a risk that the employer’s funds will be insufficient to cover the amounts we have already paid on its behalf. While such shortage and accompanying financial exposure has only occurred in very limited instances in the past, should clients default on their payment obligations in the future, we might be required to advance funds to cover such obligations. Depending on the magnitude of such an event, we may be required to seek additional sources of short-term liquidity, which may not be available on reasonable terms, if at all, and our operating results and our liquidity could be adversely affected and our banking relationships could be harmed.
Our business could be negatively impacted by disruptions in the operations of third-party providers.
We rely on third-party couriers such as the United Parcel Service, or UPS, to ship printed checks to our clients, and any disruptions in their operations that impact their ability to successfully perform their tasks may negatively impact our business. We also engage international business partners to perform certain services in countries where we currently do not have operations in and as a result may subjects us to regulatory, economic and political risks that are different from those in the United States.
We also currently have agreements with eleven major U.S. banks to execute ACH and wire transfers to support our client payroll, benefit and tax services. If one or more of the banks fails to process ACH transfers on a timely basis, or at all, then our relationship with our clients could be harmed and we could be subject to claims by a client with respect to the failed transfers. In addition, these banks have no obligation to renew their agreements with us on commercially reasonable terms, if at all. If a material number of these banks terminate their relationships with us or restrict the dollar amounts of funds that they will process on behalf of our clients, their doing so may impede our ability to process funds and could have an adverse impact on our business.
We depend on our senior management team and other key employees, and the loss of these persons or an inability to attract and retain highly skilled employees, including product development, sales, implementation, client service and other technical persons, could adversely affect our business.
Our success depends largely upon the continued services of our key executive officers. We also rely on our leadership team in the areas of product development, sales, client service, and general and administrative functions. From time to time, there may be changes in our executive management team resulting from the hiring or departure of executives, which could disrupt our business. While we have employment agreements with our executive officers, these employment agreements do not require them to continue to work for us for any specified period and, therefore, they could terminate their employment with us at any time. The loss of one or more of our executive officers or key employees could have an adverse effect on our business.
We believe that to grow our business and be successful, we must continue to develop products that are technologically advanced, are highly integrable with third-party services, provide significant mobility capabilities and have pleasing and intuitive user experiences. To do so, we must attract and retain highly qualified personnel, particularly employees with high levels of experience in designing and developing software. We must also identify, recruit and train qualified sales, client service and implementation personnel in the use of our software. The amount of time it takes for our sales representatives, client service and implementation personnel to be fully trained and to become productive varies widely. Competition for skilled employees across the United States and globally is intense. If we fail to attract new personnel or fail to retain and motivate our current personnel, our business and future growth prospects could be severely harmed. We follow a practice of hiring the best available candidates wherever located, but as we grow our business, the productivity of our product development and direct sales force may be adversely affected. In addition, if we hire employees from competitors or other companies, their former employers may attempt to assert that these employees have breached their legal obligations, resulting in a diversion of our time and resources.
Our software might not operate properly, which could damage our reputation, give rise to claims against us, or divert application of our resources from other purposes, any of which could harm our business and operating results.
Our HCM and payroll software is complex and may contain or develop undetected defects or errors, particularly when first introduced or as new versions are released. Despite extensive testing, from time to time, we have discovered defects or errors in our products. In addition, because changes in employer and legal requirements and practices relating to benefits, filing of tax returns and other regulatory reports are frequent, we may discover defects and errors in our software and service processes in the normal course of business compared against these requirements and practices. Defects and errors could also cause the information that we collect to be incomplete or contain inaccuracies that our clients, their employees and taxing and other regulatory authorities regard as significant.
Defects and errors and any failure by us to identify and address them could result in delays in product introductions and updates, loss of revenue or market share, liability to clients or others, failure to achieve market acceptance or expansion, diversion of development and other resources, injury to our reputation, and increased service and maintenance costs. The costs incurred in correcting any defects or errors or in responding to resulting claims or liability might be substantial and could adversely affect our operating results. Our clients might assert claims against us in the future alleging that they suffered damages due to a defect, error, or other failure of our product or service processes. A product
liability claim and errors or omissions claim could subject us to significant legal defense costs and adverse publicity regardless of the merits or eventual outcome of such a claim.
Our agreements with our clients typically contain provisions intended to limit our exposure to such claims, but such provisions may not be effective in limiting our exposure. Contractual limitations we use may not be enforceable and may not provide us with adequate protection against product liability claims in certain jurisdictions. A successful claim for product or service liability brought against us could result in substantial cost to us and divert management’s attention from our operations. We also maintain insurance, but our insurance may be inadequate or may not be available in the future on acceptable terms, or at all. In addition, our policy may not cover all claims made against us and defending a suit, regardless of its merit, could be costly and divert management’s attention.
If third-party software used in our products is not adequately maintained or updated, our business could be materially adversely affected.
Some of our products utilize certain third-party software. Although we believe that there are alternatives for these products, any significant interruption in the availability of such third-party software could have an adverse impact on our business unless and until we can replace the functionality provided by these products at a similar cost. Additionally, we rely, to a certain extent, upon such third parties’ abilities to enhance their current products, to develop new products on a timely and cost-effective basis and to respond to emerging industry standards and other technological changes. We may be unable to replace the functionality provided by the third-party software currently offered in conjunction with our products in the event that such software becomes obsolete or incompatible with future versions of our products or is otherwise not adequately maintained or updated.
We may acquire other companies or technologies, which could divert our management’s attention, result in additional dilution to our stockholders and otherwise disrupt our operations and adversely affect our operating results.
We have acquired and may in the future seek to acquire or invest in other businesses or technologies. The pursuit of potential acquisitions or investments may divert the attention of management and cause us to incur various expenses in identifying, investigating and pursuing suitable acquisitions, whether or not they are consummated.
We may not be able to integrate the acquired personnel, operations and technologies successfully, or effectively manage the combined business following the acquisition. Factors that may negatively impact our operating results, business and financial position, without limitation include the following:
•Inability to integrate or benefit from acquired technologies, operations, or services in a profitable manner;
•Unanticipated costs or liabilities associated with the acquisition;
•Difficulty converting the clients of the acquired business onto our modules and contract terms, including disparities in the revenues, licensing, support or professional services model of the acquired company;
•Diversion of management’s attention from other business concerns;
•Adverse effects to our existing business relationships with business partners and clients as a result of the acquisition;
•The potential loss of key employees;
•Use of resources that are needed in other parts of our business;
•Use of substantial portions of our available cash to consummate the acquisition; and
•Dilutive issuances of equity securities or the incurrence of debt.
In addition, a significant portion of the purchase price of companies we acquire may be allocated to acquired goodwill and other intangible assets, which must be assessed for impairment at least annually. In the future, if our acquisitions do not yield expected returns, we may be required to take charges to our operating results based on this impairment assessment process, which could adversely affect our results of operations.
Risks Related to Cybersecurity and Intellectual Property Rights
If our security measures are breached or unauthorized access to client data or funds is otherwise obtained, our solutions may be perceived as not being secure, clients may reduce the use of or stop using our solutions and we may incur significant liabilities.
Our solutions involve the storage and transmission of our clients’ and their employees’ proprietary and confidential information. This information includes bank account numbers, tax return information, social security numbers, benefit information, retirement account information, payroll information, system passwords, and in the case of our benefit administration solution, BeneFLEX, health information protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, as amended, or the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”). In addition, we collect and maintain personal information on our own employees in the ordinary course of our business. Finally, our business involves the storage and transmission of funds from the accounts of our clients to their employees, taxing and regulatory authorities and others. As a result, unauthorized access or security breaches of our systems, the systems of our clients or use of confidential information we obtain during the normal course of our business could result in the unauthorized disclosure of confidential information, identity and financial theft, litigation, indemnity obligations and other significant liabilities. Because the techniques used to obtain unauthorized access or sabotage systems change frequently and generally are not identified until they are employed, we may be unable to anticipate these techniques or to implement adequate preventative measures in advance. As cyber threats continue to evolve, we are focused on ensuring that our operating environments safeguard and protect personal and business information. We may be required to invest significant additional resources to comply with evolving cybersecurity regulations and to modify and enhance our information security and controls, and to investigate and remediate any security vulnerabilities. We have security measures and controls in place to protect confidential information, prevent data loss, theft and other security breaches, including penetration tests of our systems by independent third parties. However, if our security measures are breached, our business could be substantially harmed, and we could incur significant liabilities. The costs of investigating, mitigating, and reporting such a breach to affected individuals (if required) can be substantial. In addition, if a high-profile security breach occurs with respect to an industry peer, our clients and potential clients may generally lose trust in the security of HCM and payroll modules. Any such breach or unauthorized access could negatively affect our ability to attract new clients, cause existing clients to terminate their agreements with us, result in reputational damage and subject us to lawsuits, regulatory fines or other actions or liabilities which could materially and adversely affect our business and operating results.
There can be no assurance that the limitations of liability in our contracts would be enforceable or adequate or would otherwise protect us from any such liabilities or damages with respect to any particular claim related to a breach or unauthorized access. We also cannot be sure that our existing general liability insurance coverage and coverage for errors or omissions will continue to be available on acceptable terms or will be available in sufficient amounts to cover one or more large claims, or that the insurer will not deny coverage as to any future claim. The successful assertion of one or more large claims against us that exceed available insurance coverage, or the occurrence of changes in our insurance policies, including premium increases or the imposition of large deductible or co-insurance requirements, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.
Any failure to protect our intellectual property rights could impair our ability to protect our proprietary technology and our brand.
Our success is dependent, in part, upon protecting our proprietary technology. Our proprietary technologies are not covered by any patent or patent application. Instead, we rely on a combination of copyrights, trademarks, service marks, trade secret laws, and contractual restrictions to establish and protect our proprietary rights in our products and services. However, the steps we take to protect our intellectual property may be inadequate. We will not be able to protect our intellectual property if we are unable to enforce our rights or if we do not detect unauthorized use of our intellectual property. Despite our precautions, it may be possible for unauthorized third parties to copy our products and use information that we regard as proprietary to create products and services that compete with ours. Some license provisions protecting against unauthorized use, copying, transfer and disclosure of our products may be unenforceable under the laws of certain jurisdictions and foreign countries.
We enter into confidentiality and invention assignment agreements with our employees and consultants and enter into confidentiality agreements with the parties with whom we have strategic relationships and business alliances. No assurance can be given that these agreements will be effective in controlling access to and distribution of our products and proprietary information. The confidentiality agreements on which we rely to protect certain technologies may be breached and may not be adequate to protect our proprietary technologies. Further, these agreements do not prevent our competitors from independently developing technologies that are substantially equivalent or superior to our solutions.
In order to protect our intellectual property rights, we may be required to spend significant resources, including cybersecurity resources, to monitor and protect these rights. Our intellectual property could be wrongfully acquired as a result of a cyberattack or other wrongful conduct by employees or third parties. Litigation may be necessary in the future to enforce our intellectual property rights and to protect our trade secrets. Litigation brought to protect and enforce our intellectual property rights could be costly, time consuming, and distracting to management and could result in the impairment or loss of portions of our intellectual property. Furthermore, our efforts to enforce our intellectual property rights may be met with defenses, counterclaims, and countersuits attacking the validity and enforceability of our intellectual property rights. Our inability to protect our proprietary technology against unauthorized copying or use, as well as any costly litigation or diversion of our management’s attention and resources, could delay further sales or the implementation of our solutions, impair the functionality of our solutions, delay introductions of new solutions, result in our substituting inferior or more costly technologies into our solutions, or damage our reputation. In addition, we may be required to license additional technology from third parties to develop and market new solutions, and we cannot assure you that we could license that technology on commercially reasonable terms, or at all. Although we do not expect that our inability to license this technology in the future would have a material adverse effect on our business or operating results, our inability to license this technology could adversely affect our ability to compete.
We may be sued by third parties for alleged infringement of their proprietary rights.
There is considerable patent and other intellectual property development activity in our industry. Our success depends, in part, upon our not infringing upon the intellectual property rights of others. Our competitors, as well as a number of other entities and individuals, may own or claim to own intellectual property relating to our industry. From time to time, third parties may claim that we are infringing upon their intellectual property rights, and we may be found to be infringing upon such rights. In the future, others may claim that our modules and underlying technology infringe or violate their intellectual property rights. However, we may be unaware of the intellectual property rights that others may claim cover some or all of our technology or services. Any claims or litigation could cause us to incur significant expenses and, if successfully asserted against us, could require that we pay substantial damages or ongoing royalty payments, prevent us from offering our services, or require that we comply with other unfavorable terms. In connection with any such claim or litigation, we may also be obligated to indemnify our clients or business partners or pay substantial settlement costs, including royalty payments, and to obtain licenses, modify applications, or refund fees, which could be costly. Even if we were to prevail in such a dispute, any litigation regarding our intellectual property could be costly and time-consuming and divert the attention of our management and key personnel from our business operations.
The use of open source software in our products and solutions may expose us to additional risks and harm our intellectual property rights.
Some of our products and solutions use or incorporate software that is subject to one or more open source licenses. Open source software is typically freely accessible, usable and modifiable. Certain open source software licenses require a user who intends to distribute the open source software as a component of the user’s software to disclose publicly part or all of the source code to the user’s software. In addition, certain open source software licenses require the user of such software to make any derivative works of the open source code available to others on potentially unfavorable terms or at no cost.
The terms of many open source licenses to which we are subject have not been interpreted by U.S. or foreign courts. Accordingly, there is a risk that those licenses could be construed in a manner that imposes unanticipated conditions or restrictions on our ability to commercialize our solutions. In that event, we could be required to seek licenses from third parties in order to continue offering our products or solutions, to re-develop our products or solutions, to discontinue sales of our products or solutions, or to release our proprietary software code under the terms of an open source license, any of which could harm our business. Further, given the nature of open source software, it may be more likely that third parties might assert copyright and other intellectual property infringement claims against us based on our use of these open source software programs.
While we monitor the use of all open source software in our products, solutions, processes and technology and try to ensure that no open source software is used in such a way as to require us to disclose the source code to the related product or solution when we do not wish to do so, it is possible that such use may have inadvertently occurred in deploying our proprietary solutions. In addition, if a third-party software provider has incorporated certain types of open source software into software we license from such third party for our products and solutions without our knowledge, we could, under certain circumstances, be required to disclose the source code to our products and solutions. This could harm our intellectual property position and our business, results of operations and financial condition.
Risks Related to Legal and Regulatory Matters
Changes in regulatory laws or requirements applicable to our software and services could impose increased costs on us, delay or prevent our introduction of new products and services and impair the function or value of our existing products and services.
Our products and services may become subject to increasing and/or changing regulatory requirements, including changes in tax, benefit and other international and domestic laws, and as these requirements proliferate, we may be required to change or adapt our products and services to comply. Changing regulatory requirements might reduce or eliminate the need for some of our products and services, block us from developing new products and services or have an adverse effect on the functionality and acceptance of our solution. This might in turn impose additional costs upon us to comply, modify or further develop our products and services. It might also make introduction of new products and services more costly or more time-consuming than we currently anticipate or prevent introduction of such new products and services. For example, the adoption of new money transmitter or money services business statutes in jurisdictions or changes in regulators’ interpretation of existing state and federal money transmitter or money services business statutes or regulations, could subject us to registration or licensing or limit business activities until we are appropriately licensed. These occurrences could also impact how we conduct some aspects of our business or invest client funds, which could adversely impact interest income from investing client funds. Should any state or federal regulators determine that we have operated as an unlicensed money services business or money transmitter, we could be subject to civil and criminal fines, penalties, costs, legal fees, reputational damage or other negative consequences. Any of these regulatory implementations or changes could have an adverse effect on our business, operating results or financial condition.
Failure to comply with privacy laws and regulations may have a material adverse effect on reputation, financial condition, and/or operations.
Our processing of personal information for our employees and on behalf of our clients is subject to federal, state and international privacy laws. These laws, which are not uniform, generally regulate the collection, storage, transfer, and other processing of personal information; require notice to individuals of privacy practices before or at the point of collection; give individuals certain rights with respect to their personal information, including access, deletion and correction; regulate the use or disclosure of personal information for secondary purposes such as marketing; and require notification to affected individuals, clients, and/or regulators in the event of a data breach.
HIPAA, as amended by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, and its implementing regulations, applies to our benefit administration solution, BeneFLEX. The European Union General Data Protection Regulation ("GDPR"), and state consumer privacy laws like the California Consumer Protection Act ("CCPA"), which will be replaced by the California Privacy Rights Act of 2020 ("CPRA"), are among the most comprehensive privacy laws and apply to multiple areas of our business. Countries and U.S. states are increasingly adopting similarly comprehensive laws that impose new data privacy protection requirements and restrictions on covered organizations. Notably, these laws can impose significant penalties and fines on organizations for non-compliance, such as 4% of worldwide revenue for the preceding year under the GDPR. Colorado and Virginia also recently passed their own consumer data privacy statutes modeled on the CCPA, which are scheduled to go into effect in 2023.
The worldwide regulatory focus on privacy has intensified during the past several years, in part triggered by the GDPR, and has led to the rapid evolution of legal requirements related to the handling of personal information in ways that require our business to adapt to support our clients’ compliance. As this focus continues, the potential risks related to handling personal information by our business will only increase. To add to the complexity of the existing privacy landscape, many areas of existing privacy laws are subject to interpretation, which imposes an added risk that adverse interpretations of these laws by advocacy groups and governments in countries where our clients operate could impose significant obligations on our business or prevent us from offering certain services in jurisdictions where we currently operate.
Some of our modern products, such as Data Insights, use artificial intelligence and machine learning to help our clients manage their businesses and are important components of the value that our solutions provide to our clients. The ability to provide data-driven insights, however, may be constrained by current or future regulatory requirements or ethical considerations that could restrict or impose burdensome and costly requirements on our ability to continue to leverage data in innovative ways.
Enforcement actions and investigations by regulatory authorities related to security incidents and privacy violations continue to increase. Future enforcement actions or investigations could impact us through increased costs or restrictions on our businesses. A finding of noncompliance could result in significant regulatory penalties, legal liability
and burdensome governmental oversight. Additionally, security events and concerns about privacy abuses by other companies are changing consumer and social expectations for enhanced privacy. As a result, a perception of noncompliance could damage our reputation with our current and potential clients, employees and stockholders.
Adverse tax laws or regulations could be enacted, or existing laws could be applied to us or our clients, which could increase the costs of our services and adversely impact our business.
The application of federal, state, and local tax laws to services provided electronically often involve complex issues and significant judgment. New or changes to existing income, sales, use or other tax laws, statutes, rules, regulations or ordinances could be enacted at any time, possibly with retroactive effect, and could be applied solely or disproportionately to services provided over the Internet. These enactments could adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition due to the inherent cost increase.
Moreover, each state has different rules and regulations governing sales and use taxes, and these rules and regulations are subject to varying interpretations that change over time. We review these rules and regulations periodically and, when we believe we are subject to sales and use taxes in a particular state, we may voluntarily engage state tax authorities to determine how to comply with that state’s rules and regulations. We cannot, however, assure you that we will not be subject to sales and use taxes or related penalties for past sales in states where we currently believe no such taxes are required. If one or more taxing authorities determines that taxes should have, but have not, been paid with respect to our services, we might be liable for past taxes and the associated interest and penalty charges, in addition to taxes going forward, which will adversely affect our business, sales activity, results of operations and financial condition.
Any future litigation against us could be costly and time-consuming to defend.
We may become subject, from time to time, to legal proceedings and claims that arise in the ordinary course of business such as claims brought by our clients in connection with commercial disputes, employment claims made by our current or former employees, or lawsuits related to breaches of personal information. Litigation might result in substantial costs and may divert management’s attention and resources, which might seriously harm our business, overall financial condition, and operating results. Insurance might not cover such claims, might not provide sufficient payments to cover all the costs to resolve one or more such claims and might not continue to be available on terms acceptable to us. A claim brought against us that is uninsured or underinsured could result in unanticipated costs, thereby harming our operating results and leading analysts or potential investors to lower their expectations of our performance, which could reduce the trading price of our stock.
Risks Related to Financial Matters
Certain of our debt agreements contain covenants that may constrain the operation of our business, and our failure to comply with these covenants could have a material adverse effect on our financial condition.
The five-year revolving credit agreement that we entered into in July 2019 contains restrictive covenants including restrictions regarding the incurrence of liens and indebtedness, substantial changes in the general nature of our business and our subsidiaries (taken as a whole), certain merger transactions, certain sales of assets and other matters, all subject to certain exceptions. Failure to comply with these covenants could have a negative impact on our business and financial condition.
Corporate investments and client funds that we hold are subject to market, interest rate, credit and liquidity risks. The loss of these funds could have an adverse impact on our business.
We invest portions of excess cash and cash equivalents and funds held for our clients in liquid, investment-grade marketable securities such as corporate bonds, commercial paper, asset-backed securities, U.S. treasury securities, money market securities, and other cash equivalents. We follow an established investment policy and set of guidelines to monitor and help mitigate our exposure to liquidity and credit risks. Nevertheless, our corporate investments and client fund assets are subject to general market, interest rate, credit, and liquidity risks. These risks may be exacerbated, individually or in unison, during periods of unusual financial market volatility. Any loss of or inability to access our corporate investments or client funds could have adverse impacts on our business, results of operations, financial condition and liquidity.
In addition, funds held for clients are deposited in consolidated accounts on behalf of our clients, and as a result, the aggregate amounts in the accounts exceed the applicable federal deposit insurance limits. We believe that since such funds are deposited in trust on behalf of our clients, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, or the FDIC, would treat
those funds as if they had been deposited by each of the clients themselves and insure each client’s funds up to the applicable deposit insurance limits. If the FDIC were to take the position that it is not obligated to provide deposit insurance for our clients’ funds or if the reimbursement of these funds were delayed, our business and our clients could be materially harmed.
Our reported financial results may be adversely affected by changes in accounting principles generally accepted in the United States.
Generally accepted accounting principles in the United States are subject to interpretation by the Financial Accounting Standards Board, or FASB, the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, and various bodies formed to promulgate and interpret appropriate accounting principles. A change in these principles or interpretations could have a significant effect on our reported financial results, including increased volatility, and could affect the reporting of transactions completed before the announcement of a change.
Risks Related to Ownership of Our Common Stock
Insiders have substantial control over us, which may limit our stockholders’ ability to influence corporate matters and delay or prevent a third party from acquiring control over us.
As of July 29, 2022, our directors, executive officers and holders of more than 5% of our common stock, together with their respective affiliates, beneficially owned, in the aggregate, approximately 26.7% of our outstanding common stock. This significant concentration of ownership may adversely affect the trading price for our common stock because investors often perceive disadvantages in owning stock in companies with controlling stockholders. In addition, these stockholders will be able to exercise influence over all matters requiring stockholder approval, including the election of directors and approval of corporate transactions, such as a merger or other sale of our company or its assets. This concentration of ownership could limit the ability of our other stockholders to influence corporate matters and may have the effect of delaying or preventing a change in control, including a merger, consolidation, or other business combination involving us, or discouraging a potential acquirer from making a tender offer or otherwise attempting to obtain control, even if that change in control would benefit our other stockholders.
Our stock price may be subject to wide fluctuations.
The market price of our common stock has experienced, and may continue to experience, wide fluctuations and increased volatility. Factors that may impact our performance and market price include those discussed elsewhere in this “Risk Factors” section of this Annual Report on Form 10-K and others such as:
•Our operating performance and the operating performance of similar companies;
•Announcements by us or our competitors of acquisitions, business plans or commercial relationships;
•Any major change in our board of directors or senior management;
•Publication of research reports or news stories about us, our competitors, or our industry, or positive or negative recommendations or withdrawal of research coverage by securities analysts;
•The public’s reaction to our press releases, our other public announcements and our filings with the SEC;
•Sales of our common stock by our directors, executive officers and affiliates;
•Adverse market reaction to any indebtedness we may incur or securities we may issue in the future;
•Short sales, hedging and other derivative transactions in our common stock;
•Threatened or actual litigation;
•Public health issues such as the COVID-19 pandemic; and
•Other events or factors, including changes in general conditions in the United States and global economies or financial markets (including acts of God, war, incidents of terrorism, inflationary pressures or other destabilizing events and the resulting responses to them).
In addition, the stock market in general and the market for software or technology-related companies in particular, have experienced extreme price and volume fluctuations that have often been unrelated or disproportionate to the operating performance of those companies. Securities class action litigation has often been instituted against companies following periods of volatility in the overall market and in the market price of a company’s securities. This litigation, if instituted against us, could result in substantial costs, divert our management’s attention and resources, and harm our business, operating results, and financial condition.
We do not currently intend to pay dividends on our common stock and, consequently, your ability to achieve a return on your investment will depend on appreciation in the price of our common stock.
We have not declared or paid dividends on our common stock in the past three fiscal years and do not currently intend to do so for the foreseeable future. We currently intend to invest our future earnings to fund our growth and other corporate initiatives. Therefore, you are not likely to receive any dividends on your common stock for the foreseeable future, and the success of an investment in shares of our common stock will depend upon future appreciation in its value, if any. There is no guarantee that shares of our common stock will appreciate in value or even maintain the price at which our stockholders purchased their shares.
Future sales of shares of our common stock by existing stockholders could depress the market price of our common stock.
As of July 29, 2022, we had an aggregate of 55,277,660 outstanding shares of common stock. The 17,362,750 shares sold in our initial public offering, follow-on offering and secondary offering can be freely sold in the public market without restriction. The remaining shares can be freely sold in the public market, subject in some cases to volume and other restrictions under Rule 144 and 701 under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and various agreements.
In addition, we have registered 22,053,893 shares of common stock that we have issued and may issue under our equity plans. These shares can be freely sold in the public market upon issuance, subject in some cases to volume and other restrictions under Rules 144 and 701 under the Securities Act, and various vesting agreements. In addition, some of our employees, including our executive officers, have entered into 10b5-1 trading plans regarding sales of shares of our common stock. These plans provide for sales to occur from time to time. If any of these additional shares are sold, or if it is perceived that they will be sold, in the public market, the trading price of our common stock could decline.
Also, in the future, we may issue additional securities in connection with investments and acquisitions. The amount of our common stock issued in connection with an investment or acquisition could constitute a material portion of our then outstanding stock. Due to these factors, sales of a substantial number of shares of our common stock in the public market could occur at any time. These sales, or the perception in the market that the holders of a large number of shares intend to sell shares, could reduce the market price of our common stock.
Anti-takeover provisions in our charter documents and Delaware law could discourage, delay, or prevent a change in control of our company and may affect the trading price of our common stock.
We are a Delaware corporation and the anti-takeover provisions of the Delaware General Corporation Law, which apply to us, may discourage, delay or prevent a change in control by prohibiting us from engaging in a business combination with an interested stockholder for a period of three years after the stockholder becomes an interested stockholder, even if a change in control would be beneficial to our existing stockholders. In addition, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws may discourage, delay or prevent a change in our management or control over us that stockholders may consider favorable. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and bylaws:
•Authorize the issuance of “blank check” convertible preferred stock that could be issued by our board of directors to thwart a takeover attempt;
•Establish a classified board of directors, as a result of which the successors to the directors whose terms have expired will be elected to serve from the time of election and qualification until the third annual meeting following their election;
•Require that directors only be removed from office for cause and only upon a supermajority stockholder vote;
•Provide that vacancies on the board of directors, including newly-created directorships, may be filled only by a majority vote of directors then in office rather than by stockholders;
•Prevent stockholders from calling special meetings; and
•Prohibit stockholder action by written consent, requiring all actions to be taken at a meeting of the stockholders.
Our bylaws provide that the state and federal courts located within the state of Delaware are the sole and exclusive forums for certain legal actions involving the company or our directors, officers and employees.
On February 2, 2016, we amended our bylaws to designate the state and federal courts located within the state of Delaware as the sole and exclusive forums for claims arising derivatively, pursuant to the Delaware General Corporation Law or governed by the internal affairs doctrine. The choice of forum provision is expressly authorized by the Delaware General Corporation Law, which was amended so that companies would not have to litigate internal claims in more than one jurisdiction. If a court were to find the exclusive forum provision contained in our bylaws to be inapplicable or unenforceable, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving such extra-forum claims, which could adversely affect our business and financial condition. This bylaws provision, therefore, may dissuade or discourage claimants from initiating lawsuits or claims against us or our directors and officers in forums other than Delaware.
General Risk Factors
Our business, results of operations and financial condition have been, and will continue to be, adversely impacted by the uncertainties and consequences stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Our business depends on the overall demand for HCM and payroll software and services, and on the economic health of our current and prospective clients. The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on our business, clients, partners, employees, markets and financial results and condition, are evolving and dependent on numerous unpredictable factors outside of our control, including:
•The duration and severity of the pandemic as a public health matter and its impact on governments, businesses, society, our clients, our partners and our business;
•The measures being taken by governments, businesses and society in response to the pandemic
•The scope and effectiveness of fiscal and monetary stimulus programs and other legislative and regulatory measures being implemented by federal, state and local governments;
•The increase in business failures among our clients and other businesses;
•The pace and extent to which our clients and other businesses recover and add employees and other compensated individuals; and
•The willingness of current and prospective clients to invest in our products and services.
Any of these factors may impact our business unfavorably. There can be no assurance that the economic recovery will continue or offset the uncertainty and instability resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Even as the COVID-19 pandemic subsides, we may continue to experience adverse impacts to our business as a result of its global economic impact, including any recession, economic downturn, inflation, or increased unemployment that has occurred or may occur in the future.
If we are unable to maintain effective internal controls over financial reporting, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports and the market price of our common stock may be negatively affected.
As a public company, we are required to maintain internal controls over financial reporting and to report any material weaknesses in such internal controls. Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, or the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, requires that we evaluate and determine the effectiveness of our internal controls over financial reporting and provide a management report on the internal controls over financial reporting. In addition, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires that our management report on the internal controls over financial reporting be attested to by our independent registered public accounting firm. If we have a material weakness in our internal controls over financial reporting, we may not detect errors on a timely basis and our financial statements may be materially misstated. Compliance with these public company requirements has made some activities more time-consuming, costly and complicated. If we identify material weaknesses in our internal controls over financial reporting, if we are unable to assert that our internal controls over financial reporting are effective, or if our independent registered public accounting firm is unable to express an opinion as to the effectiveness of our internal controls over financial reporting, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports and the market price of our common stock could be negatively affected, and we could become subject to investigations by the stock exchange on which our securities are listed, the SEC or other regulatory authorities, which could require additional financial and management resources.