ueic-20241231
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UNITED STATES
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20549
_______________________________________
FORM 10-K
_______________________________________
(Mark One)
For the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024
OR
For the transition period from to
Commission File Number: 0-21044
_______________________________________
UNIVERSAL ELECTRONICS INC.
(Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in its Charter)
15147 N. Scottsdale Road, Suite H300, Scottsdale, Arizona85254-2494
(Address of principal executive offices and zip code)
(480) 530-3000
(Registrant's telephone number, including area code)
_____________________
Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:
Title of each class Trading Symbol(s) Name of each exchange on which registered
Common Stock, par value $0.01 per share UEIC The NASDAQ Stock Market LLC
Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act:
None
_______________________________________
Indicate by check mark if the registrant is a well-known seasoned issuer, as defined in Rule 405 of the Securities Act. Yes ☐No ☒
Indicate by check mark if the registrant is not required to file reports pursuant to Section 13 or Section 15(d) of the Act. Yes ☐No☒
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days. Yes☒ No ̈
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has submitted electronically every Interactive Data File required to be submitted pursuant to Rule 405 of Regulation S-T (§232.405 of this chapter) during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to submit such files). Yes☒ No ☐
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, a smaller reporting company, or an emerging growth company. See the definitions of "large accelerated filer", "accelerated filer," "smaller reporting company," and "emerging growth company" in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act.
Large accelerated filer ☐ Accelerated filer ☒
Non-accelerated filer ☐ Smaller reporting company ☐
Emerging growth company ☐
If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a) of the Exchange Act. ☐
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant has filed a report on and attestation to its management's assessment of the effectiveness of its internal control over financial reporting under Section 404(b) of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (15 U.S.C. 7262(b)) by the registered public accounting firm that prepared or issued its audit report ☒
If securities are registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act, indicate by check mark whether the financial statements of the registrant included in the filing reflect the correction of an error to previously issued financial statements.☐
Indicate by check mark whether any of those error corrections are restatements that required a recovery analysis of incentive-based compensation received by any of the registrant’s executive officers during the relevant recovery period pursuant to §240.10D-1(b).☐
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a shell company (as defined in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act). Yes ☐ No ☒
The aggregate market value of the voting and non-voting common equity held by non-affiliates of the registrant on June 28, 2024, the last business day of the registrant's most recently completed second fiscal quarter, was $124,876,933 based upon the closing sale price of the Company's common stock as reported on the NASDAQ Stock Market for that date.
On March 7, 2025, 13,111,653 shares of Common Stock, par value $.01 per share, of the registrant were outstanding.
DOCUMENTS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE:
Portions of the registrant's notice of annual meeting of shareholders and proxy statement to be filed pursuant to Regulation 14A within 120 days after registrant's fiscal year end of December 31, 2024 are incorporated by reference into Part III of this Form 10-K. The Proxy Statement will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission no later than April 30, 2025.
Except as otherwise stated, the information contained in this Form 10-K is as of December 31, 2024.
Table of Contents
UNIVERSAL ELECTRONICS INC.
Annual Report on Form 10-K
For the Fiscal Year Ended December 31, 2024
Table of Contents
ItemNumber PageNumber
PART I
1 Business 3
1A Risk Factors 14
1B Unresolved Staff Comments 29
1C Cybersecurity 29
3 Legal Proceedings 30
4 Mine Safety Disclosures 30
PART II
7A Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk 39
8 Financial Statements and Supplementary Data 41
9A Controls and Procedures 80
9B Other Information 82
9C Disclosure Regarding Foreign Jurisdictions that Prevent Inspections 82
PART III
10 Directors, Executive Officers and Corporate Governance 82
11 Executive Compensation 82
13 Certain Relationships and Related Transactions, and Director Independence 83
14 Principal Accountant Fees and Services 83
PART IV
15 Exhibits and Financial Statement Schedules 83
Signatures 87
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PART I
ITEM 1. BUSINESS
Universal Electronics Inc. ("UEI" or the "Company") was incorporated under the laws of Delaware in 1986 and began operations in 1987. The principal executive offices are located at 15147 N. Scottsdale Road, Suite H300, Scottsdale, Arizona 85254. As used herein, the terms "we", "us" and "our" refer to UEI and its subsidiaries unless the context indicates the contrary.
Additional information regarding UEI may be obtained at www.uei.com. Our website address is not intended to function as a hyperlink and the information available at our website address is not incorporated by reference into this Annual Report on Form 10-K. We make our periodic and current reports, together with amendments to these reports, available on our website, free of charge, as soon as reasonably practicable after such material is electronically filed with, or furnished to, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"). The SEC maintains a website at www.sec.gov that contains the reports, proxy and other information that we file electronically with the SEC.
Our business is comprised of one reportable segment. We have one domestic subsidiary and 24 international subsidiaries located in Brazil, British Virgin Islands, France, Germany, Hong Kong (3), India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico (2), the Netherlands, the People's Republic of China (the "PRC") (6), Singapore, Spain, United Kingdom and Vietnam.
Our mission is to create a user centric, smart home experience through innovative control products that provide the simplest way to interact with technology in the home. We aim to provide universal and interoperable control solutions that automatically set up and deliver consistent and intuitive control of connected devices, content and services.
Sales
We design, develop, manufacture, ship and support home entertainment control products, technology and software solutions, climate control solutions, wireless sensor and smart home control products and audio-video ("AV") accessories, that are used by the world's leading brands in the home entertainment, climate control, consumer electronics, security, home automation and home appliance markets. Our product and technology offerings include:
•Home Entertainment Products: Our industry-leading portfolio includes radio frequency ("RF") capable, voice-enabled universal remote control products; low-power RF and energy-harvesting microcontrollers, as well as, embedded and Cloud software for AV and smart home device and content discovery and control. These solutions are sold primarily to video service providers and consumer electronics original equipment manufacturer ("OEM") customers. We also distribute a broad portfolio of replacement remote controls, powerful free-to-air antennae and television and soundbar wall mounts direct to retailers worldwide under the One For All® brand.
•Climate Control Solutions: Our innovative climate control solutions include wall-mounted and handheld thermostat controllers and connected accessories for smart energy management systems. These products are primarily sold to OEM customers, as well as hotels, hospitality and system integrators. Our UEI TIDE family of climate control solutions feature advanced technologies such as Wi-Fi, BLE, Zigbee and Matter, along with sensors for temperature, humidity, proximity, occupancy and carbon dioxide sensing.
•Smart Home and Security Products: We offer proprietary and standards-based RF sensors designed for residential security, safety and home automation applications. Our integrated circuits, on which our software and universal control database is embedded, are sold primarily to OEMs, video service providers, smart home dealers and private label customers.
•Software and Cloud Services: Our software, firmware and technology solutions enable devices such as smart TVs, hybrid set-top boxes, audio systems, smart speakers, game consoles and other consumer electronic and smart home devices to wirelessly connect and interoperate within home networks. These solutions support control and delivery of home entertainment application services and content, smart home services and device or system information. New features include private, on-premise user presence and occupancy detection to enhance user experiences with their connected devices.
•Intellectual Property and Licensing: We license our intellectual property primarily to OEMs and video service providers. Our cloud-enabled software provides reliable firmware update provisioning and digital rights management validation services to major consumer electronics brands. We offer regular control library database and software updates to our licensing customers to ensure their systems are compatible with the latest devices entering the home.
Over the past few years, our strategic focus has been towards expanding our presence in the climate control market. This focus is driven by the growing demand for energy-efficient and smart climate control solutions in both residential and commercial applications.
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We serve a diverse range of markets, including consumer electronics, video services, climate control, security, home automation and hospitality. We have a strong presence in the global market, with a top-tier customer base that includes four of the top five global smart TV brands and five of the top ten HVAC OEM brands. Our products are used by major video service providers, consumer electronics companies and home automation and security brands.
Our sales channel strategy is to partner with customers who are leaders in their respective industries: in consumer electronics, we count Samsung Electronics Co., Sony Group Corporation and LG Electronics as long-term accounts that represent a significant share of their industry; in cable video services, Comcast Corporation, Liberty Global and Vodafone Group rank amongst the largest video service providers in their respective markets; in Satellite services, Dish Network Corporation, Sky plc, Bharti Airtel Limited and DIRECTV represent the majority of global service providers; in climate control, Daikin Industries Ltd., Trane Technologies and Carrier Global Corporation are customers that represent top market share leaders in the global HVAC industry; and in security, safety and home automation, Vivint Smart Home, Somfy SA, Ring LLC and Hunter Douglas NV are channel leaders in their respective connected home markets.
Distribution methods for our control solutions vary depending on the sales channel. We distribute remote control devices, connected thermostats, integrated circuits ("ICs"), home security sensors and AV accessories directly to video and security service providers and OEMs, both domestically and internationally. We distribute connected thermostats and home security sensors to pro-security installers and hospitality system integrators in the United States and Europe through a network of national and regional distributors and dealers. Additionally, we sell our wireless control devices and AV accessories under the One For All®, Ecolink® and private label brand names to retailers in key markets, such as in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France and Spain. We utilize third-party distributors for the retail channel in countries where we do not have subsidiaries.
For the years ended December 31, 2024, 2023 and 2022, our sales to Daikin Industries Ltd. accounted for 13.3%, 14.0% and 14.4% of our net sales, respectively. For the year ended December 31, 2022, our sales to Comcast Corporation accounted for 14.0% of our net sales.
Products and Technology
Our flagship product, QuickSet® ("QuickSet") is a software solution that is primarily delivered as a cloud-based service, but is also embedded in many entertainment and smart home platforms worldwide, to enable universal device and content discovery system setup, device interoperability and system control. QuickSet and QuickSet Cloud utilize data transmitted over various communication protocols including HDMI, low power RF (such as Bluetooth or Zigbee, including Zigbee 3.0 and Zigbee RF4CE), Thread, Matter, Internet Protocol ("IP"), Consumer Electronics Control ("CEC") and infrared to detect various attributes of connected devices, including services (apps), content history and whole home audio. They enable user access and control across all their smart, connected devices as well as their legacy (non-connected) devices enhancing the user's experience across their smart home landscape. With QuickSet and QuickSet Cloud, OEM customers can deliver seamless user experiences allowing consumers to switch easily between entertainment and smart home activities and reliably access and view content with a single touch. A QuickSet and QuickSet Cloud user experience can be delivered via a tactile remote, touchscreen interface, on-screen graphical user interface or voice-enabled system.
QuickSet's expanded functionality includes entertainment and whole home audio use cases to provide deeper device and content history across an ever-increasing landscape of devices and services in the home. The latest release ofQuickSet, QuickSet homeSense, serves as a foundational block for home intelligence that learns and adapts to home environments to unlock personalized experiences in energy management, entertainment control and advertising. Our privacy-first approach in capturing user preferences across devices helps increase engagement through enhanced personalized recommendations for a better end-user experience.
QuickSet Widgets and QuickSet Widget Pro provide fully managed Internet of Things ("IoT") capability to non-connected electronic devices for fast time-to-market and enable digital transformation of end-user interaction. The multi-protocol modules enable advanced connectivity with dual-band Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.3 and support for Matter, Zigbee and Open Thread Border Router host services. They include native support of Matter across the QuickSet Widget family with Virtual Agent-assisted easy onboarding. This enables products powered by the QuickSet Widget including the UEI TIDE family of smart thermostats to be Cloud-ready and Matter-capable.
UEI Virtual Agent is, an innovative self-service support solution, that simplifies device onboarding by allowing customers to seamlessly hand-off the set-up process from a large screen (SmartTV) to a smaller one (mobile phone). Integrated into the latest version of QuickSet, UEI Virtual Agent provides automated steps for onboarding, feature discovery and troubleshooting
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capabilities and is available both as a web-based application and a TV app for integration into existing infrastructures. UEI Virtual Agent, when bundled with our newest set of UEI NetReady services for remote diagnostics and customer support, further enhance the support experience for products already deployed in the home.
Licensees of QuickSet and/or QuickSet Cloud products and support services, include service providers such as Comcast Corporation, Charter Communications, TiVo, DIRECTV and DISH Network Corporation; smart TV manufacturers such as Sony Group Corporation, LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics Co.; leading game console manufacturers Sony and Microsoft on their respective gaming consoles; and has grown to include HVAC and emerging home automation customers.
Our latest release of QuickSet, supporting device and content discovery, QuickSet homeSense and whole home audio, is currently in proof of concept evaluation on broadband gateway platforms from major telcos in the U.S. and Europe.
Our leading portfolio of home entertainment products include our Emmy® award-winning voice remote controls that have become a staple of the home entertainment control industry. This technology, powered by our proprietary silicon platform, allows users to use voice to interact with their video services and content through the remote control while using low power RF standards, such as Bluetooth LE (BLE) and Zigbee to provide the bandwidth needed for voice transmission to the set-top box or television. We also ship ultra-low power SOCs for use in Samsung's flagship remote control to power their energy-harvesting photo-voltaic (PV) cells.
With our commitment to create environmentally sustainable solutions that do not compromise but enhance product performance, we offer UEI Eterna, a line of voice-enabled control solutions designed with our new generation of Extreme Low-Power System-on-Chip and energy harvesting technologies to deliver increased processing capability while using significantly less power compared to prior generations. The energy-harvesting version features our "Battery-4-Life" technology that relies on collecting energy from the environment's ambient light and radio frequencies to deliver a control solution that requires no battery replacement over the useful life of the product. Our ultra-low power remotes are now shipping with Liberty Global's latest video service platform offering.
Our UEI TIDE family, including UEI TIDE Dial, Touch and Bridge, have been developed and deployed as white label smart thermostat platforms under major HVAC OEMs, as well as, hospitality and smart home-branded customers. These products are designed to provide intelligent climate control solutions that enhance user comfort and energy efficiency through a complete energy management platform that seamlessly integrates with both central, hybrid and space HVAC systems. The platform is capable of supporting energy insight capabilities through our software-defined occupancy and presence detection technology, QuickSet homeSense, with recommendations to optimize cost and comfort for users. In addition, the UEI TIDE family products offer native cloud connectivity and feature our latest device management and lifecycle support services which simplify setup and control and allows interoperability with a variety of smart home devices and ecosystems. The smart thermostat line includes all the necessary connectivity technologies to address the evolving smart home, including seamless connection to the cloud over Wi-Fi plus local device connectivity via Bluetooth Smart, Zigbee and Infrared, and includes support for Matter, the industry's latest smart home connectivity standard. We continue to enhance our UEI TIDE family of products to provide enhancements and new features for the everchanging home environment.
In smart home, UEI Butler smart hubs, powered by QuickSet Cloud, align with our product and technology strategy to enable discovery, control and interaction across disparate connected devices in the home to create smarter living for a growing list of smart home B2B customers. This family of smart home hubs, complemented by our complete range of Zigbee sensors and accessories, enables customers to deliver tailored and managed experiences for their products while allowing for greater interoperability with other brands and ecosystems consumers have in their homes. The hubs bring interoperability covering a wide range of wireless protocols including legacy IR for entertainment and air conditioning devices, Zigbee, Bluetooth and IP devices, as well as, the fast-growing Matter-compatible device category.
Our full-featured hubs deliver seamless interoperability, including i) pre-integration support for a complete range of Zigbee sensors and thermostats to create tailored kits for energy management, climate control, smart lighting and more; ii) built-in Zigbee radios, powerful IR Blasters and support for Wi-Fi or ethernet configuration for flexible placement in any room in the home; iii) Matter bridging capability for control of non-matter devices via built-in iOS and Android home apps; iv) Matter controller and multi-admin capability to work alongside other Matter controllers for a seamless end-user experience, or to create a new Matter environment in a home; v) built-in support for nevo.ai virtual agent for a seamless onboarding experience, personalization and troubleshooting when help is needed; and vi) option for far-field voice to add hands-free control to any smart TV, streaming or cable/satellite set-top box or audio device.
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Our complete family of Butler Smart Home hubs leverage QuickSet Cloud’s powerful device discovery and configuration abilities, and work with any Zigbee-enabled nodes or UEI-developed sensors with complete rule-based automation and scene creation features.
In home security, safety and automation, we offer universal sub-gigahertz products that are compatible with the top security panel manufacturers, such as Honeywell, GE, Tyco/DSC and 2GIG. In the Do-It-Yourself ("DIY") residential security channel, we offer sensor-based products using industry standard Z-Wave and Zigbee protocols.
Markets and Competition
In recent years, we have seen a significant change in our markets with the rise of the direct-to-consumer streaming video apps that are enabled on smart TVs and streaming devices as well as advanced set-top boxes. This has resulted in a change in mix in our customer base, especially in the U.S., where our traditional customers in cable and satellite have been complemented with new customers in the digital media streaming domain. Today our portfolio includes universal control products compatible with Apple's tvOS and Google's AndroidTV platforms designed for the Multichannel Video Programming Distributor market allowing subscribers access to subscription-based channels through hybrid and Over the Top ("OTT") streaming platforms.
Additionally, some of our current customers have successfully introduced media streaming services and expanded their footprint to new end-users. Comcast-Charter's Xumo TV, Tivo Stream, Comcast's Flex, Sky Glass and DISH Sling are examples of current customer offerings of these types of services. Additionally, these brands, along with our OEM customers in consumer electronics, such as LG with their WebOS, are expanding their customer footprints through distribution of their OS platforms that include our QuickSet technologies, allowing us to grow our global technology footprint and grow our licensing revenue in those channels.
At the same time, we have seen our markets in Home Entertainment OEM, and especially our smart TV OEMs, successfully upgrade to streaming service aggregators. The advanced TV interfaces on smart TVs and related streaming devices offer platforms for personalized advertising and smart home services which is expected to ensure demand for our wireless and wired control products, microcontrollers and software technology.
Over the past few years, the climate control industry has experienced a rise in demand due to the growing focus on the implementation of advanced HVAC equipment, such as heat pumps, driven by government subsidies and incentives aimed at promoting energy-efficient technologies. The consumer demand to upgrade to smart thermostats is driven by the integration of intelligent climate control solutions for enhanced user comfort and energy efficiency, increased cloud connectivity, support for smart home ecosystems and the adoption of energy management platforms utilizing occupancy and presence detection technology. Furthermore, our OEM customers are equally motivated to bring these cloud-connected capabilities to their thermostat products as the benefits gained in accessing system data for preventive and predictive maintenance of the HVAC systems, far outweigh the added investments in these more advanced (smart) thermostats.
Leveraging our scale and expertise in low-power RF microcontrollers, we continue to pursue further penetration of our traditional OEM consumer electronics markets as well as newer product categories in the smart home and IoT markets including smart lighting, smart and motorized shades, as well as smart toilets and faucets, which rely on smart connectivity and control technologies to reduce water use and improve user experience. Customers in these markets integrate our connectivity and cloud-based solutions, services and technology into their products to enhance their consumer lifestyle ecosystems. Growth in these markets has been driven by the increasing demand for more energy efficient homes, consumer convenience and the increasing proliferation of connected devices.
Our principal competitors in the home entertainment market are Remote Solutions, Home Control International, SMK, Ohsung, Tech4Home and Ruwido. In the climate control market, we compete with regional specialists and global companies such as Resideo, Emerson and Venstar, as well as Far East based OEM manufacturers such as Computime, who compete with us on customer RFQs. In the connected smart home market, we compete with the OEMs themselves as well as wireless manufacturers in North America, such as Nice, and several original design manufacturers in Asia, as well as technology system providers such as Tuya. In the home security, safety and automation market, we compete with offshore-based, original design and built-to-print hardware manufacturers, such as Leedarson and Xavi Technologies. In the international retail and private label markets for wireless controls we compete primarily with a variety of accessory trading and branding companies like Jasco and Hama, as well as various manufacturers of AV accessories in Asia.
We compete in our markets on the basis of product quality, enhanced features, intellectual property, local design and development expertise, local development support and end-user support for our OFA branded products. We believe that we will
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need to continue to introduce new and innovative products and software solutions to remain competitive and to recruit and retain competent personnel to successfully accomplish our future objectives.
Global Locations and Subsidiaries
We operate on a global scale with research and development ("R&D") teams in the U.S., Europe, the PRC and India. The company has diversified manufacturing facilities in Vietnam, the PRC, Mexico and Brazil. This global presence allows us to leverage our scale and reach to deliver innovative products and solutions to customers worldwide.
Our 25 domestic and international subsidiaries are the following:
•C.G. Development Ltd., established in Hong Kong;
•CG Mexico Distribution Co., S. de R.L. de C.V., established in Mexico;
•CG Mexico Remote Controls, S. de R.L. de C.V., established in Mexico;
•Ecolink Intelligent Technology, Inc.; established under the laws of Delaware;
•Enson Assets Ltd., established in the British Virgin Islands;
•Gemstar Polyfirst Ltd., established in Hong Kong;
•Gemstar Technology (Qinzhou) Co. Ltd., established in the PRC;
•Gemstar Technology (Yangzhou) Co. Ltd., established in the PRC;
•Guangzhou Universal Electronics Service Co., Ltd., established in the PRC;
•One For All France S.A.S., established in France;
•One For All GmbH, established in Germany;
•One For All Iberia S.L., established in Spain;
•One For All UK Ltd., established in the United Kingdom;
•Qinzhou Universal Trading Co. Ltd., established in the PRC;
•UE Japan Ltd., established in Japan;
•UE Korea Ltd., established in South Korea;
•UE Singapore Pte. Ltd., established in Singapore;
•UE Vietnam Company Limited, established in Vietnam;
•UEI Electronics Pte. Ltd., established in India;
•UEI Hong Kong Pte. Ltd., established in Hong Kong;
•Universal Electronics B.V., established in the Netherlands;
•Universal Electronics Italia S.R.L., established in Italy;
•Universal Electronics Yangzhou Co. Ltd., established in the PRC;
•Universal Electronics do Brasil Ltda., established in Brazil; and
•Yangzhou Universal Trading Co. Ltd., established in the PRC.
Resources
Engineering
Our development resources include approximately 540 engineering and R&D team members worldwide, who are dedicated to designing and developing cutting-edge consumer control products, technologies and software services. We invest heavily in technology and product innovation, focusing on creating smarter living solutions for our customers.
Extensive engineering resources were directed at completing the development and testing of our UEI TIDE family of products, including development and sales support to secure design wins across our HVAC OEM, multi-dwelling unit (MDU) and utilities customers. These platforms are key to our ability to penetrate the climate control OEM market and our ability to introduce unique features and capabilities in these platforms to promote and demonstrate our differentiated features in customer-specific products.
Leading up to the International Consumer Electronics (CES) show in January 2025, our engineers worked on integrating, and demonstrating, new features on our UEI TIDE platforms, such as Matter, QuickSet homeSense, energy insights, and a device-based rules engine. We believe that these features were well received by existing and new customers and will serve us well for new design wins in 2025 and new product introductions in 2026 and beyond.
The expanded UEI TIDE family portfolio includes the UEI TIDE Dial, Touch and Bridge available in various SKUs to cater to different market needs. The UEI TIDE Dial (US24) and UEI TIDE Dial (EU24/EUUSB) models now support Zigbee Coordinator functionality, enabling a complete energy management platform seamlessly integrated with HVAC systems, energy
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insight capabilities, and new software-defined occupancy and presence detection technology, QuickSet homeSense. These models also offer Matter support, allowing for wide interoperability with major smart home ecosystems.
One of the key features of the UEI TIDE Family is its ability to manage both central and space HVAC systems, providing optimized climate control and energy savings. Users can control hybrid systems that mix central and mini-split systems from a single thermostat through support for IR, making it easier to manage the whole home climate. UEI TIDE Dial and Touch also support nevo®.ai, our AI-powered agent that offers support for on-boarding, remote control and built-in tier 0 support, enhancing user convenience and control throughout the lifecycle of the product.
At CES, we also offered customers a sneak-peak at our next generation smart thermostat platform (UEI TIDE Pro). Built from the ground up with a new architecture, this upcoming platform will feature a larger, higher-resolution display, support for on-device AI processing, Thread and Open Thread Border Router (OTBR), and QuickSet 7 support with a built-in Matter Controller with Multi-Admin capabilities. The new platform will also introduce an advanced software framework, allowing for the development of operating system and graphical user interfaces under a limited power budget.
During 2024, our development teams successfully completed and released new products in the connected home space for customers such as Daikin, Carrier, Mitsubishi, Somfy and Vivint, the majority of which launched in the back half of the year.
During 2024, our advanced engineering efforts focused on further developing our existing products, services and technologies. We released a host of unique QuickSet Cloud features such as QuickSet homeSense for occupancy and presence detection, video and audio content and app history, and support for Thread, as well as continued development initiatives around existing and emerging technologies, such as Zigbee 3.0, Bluetooth Smart, WiFi and Matter, a unifying, IP-based connectivity protocol built on proven technologies designed to connect smart home devices reliably and securely across disparate IoT ecosystems. We continued to evolve the capabilities of our service platform (UEI Virtual Agent) on our UEI TIDE and UEI Eterna product platforms for easier device onboarding, identification and troubleshooting.
As a contributor to the Matter specification, we continue to be an active participant in several working groups and Plugfest events to help bring the full interoperability potential of the Matter standard to market.
In general, our technical staff are involved in various industry organizations and bodies, which are in the process of setting standards for IR and RF communication and networking in the home. Our participation ensures comprehensive understanding of the technical specifications being developed that can affect the deployment and proliferation of future standards and technologies in the home.
Because of the nature of R&D activities, there can be no assurance that any of our R&D projects will be successfully completed or ultimately achieve commercial success.
Intellectual Property and Technology
A key factor in creating products and software for home entertainment and smart home device control is our proprietary device knowledge libraries. Each year our device and content discovery control libraries and HVAC engine continue to grow across the smart home landscape, supporting common and emerging smart home and HVAC control protocols, including IR, HDMI-CEC, Bluetooth and its variants, Zigbee (Rf4CE), Z-Wave, Thread, Matter and IP networks.
Our HVAC engine includes software that delivers logic and sequence control of relays in smart thermostats for efficient operation of a variety of heating and cooling equipment such as heat pumps, single, dual and multi-fuel (gas, oil and electric) HVAC systems. Additionally, we maintain libraries of proprietary software protocols used by many of the leading HVAC OEM brands worldwide that enable bi-directional communication of control and diagnostic data for efficient and optimized HVAC system operation.
We have developed a broad portfolio of patented technologies and the industry's leading database of device and content discovery, setup and control software. We ship integrated circuits, on which our software and control libraries are embedded and that connect to our cloud services, directly to manufacturers for inclusion in their products. In addition, we license our software and technology to manufacturers.
Our technology also includes other remote controlled home entertainment devices and home automation control modules, as well as wired CEC and wireless IP control protocols commonly found on many of the latest HDMI and internet connected devices. Our proprietary software automatically detects, identifies and enables the appropriate control infrastructure for many home entertainment and automation devices in the home. Our libraries are continuously updated using knowledge captured
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directly from the original device or from the manufacturers' written specifications to ensure the accuracy and integrity of the libraries.
We hold and apply for patents in the United States and abroad related to our discovery, setup and control technologies across climate control, residential safety and security and smart home automation applications. Our patents have remaining lives ranging from less than one to 18 years. We have also obtained copyright registration and claim copyright protection for certain proprietary software and libraries of our device control libraries. Additionally, the names of many of our products are registered, or are being registered, as trademarks in the United States Patent and Trademark Office and in most of the other countries in which such products are sold. These registrations are valid for terms ranging up to 20 years and may be renewed as long as the trademarks continue to be used and are deemed by management to be important to our operations. While we follow the practice of obtaining patent, copyright and trademark registrations on new developments whenever advisable, in certain cases we have elected common law trade secret protection in lieu of obtaining such other protection.
Manufacturing and Supply
We are vertically integrated across design, development, and manufacturing. Our manufacturing capabilities include high-quality surface mount technology, zero-gap, plastic injection, acoustic design, painting, keypad, robot soldering, and laser etching. We currently operate manufacturing and assembly factories in the PRC, Vietnam, Mexico and Brazil, which allows us to produce in the regional markets. We also use selected third-party manufacturers and suppliers in Asia and India.
Our long-term factory planning strategy is to de-risk our reliance on a PRC-based supply chain by (1) reducing our manufacturing concentration in the PRC, (2) pursuing lower cost jurisdictions for manufacturing to help ensure market competitive products and (3) offering customers a flexible and globally diverse manufacturing footprint to provide a reliable and cost-efficient supply chain. As part of the execution of this strategy, we (1) opened a new factory in Vietnam, which commenced operations in June 2023, (2) stopped production activities in our southwestern PRC factory in the third quarter 2023 and completed its shutdown in the first quarter 2024, (3) stopped production activities and shutdown operations of our smaller eastern PRC factory during the fourth quarter 2024 and (4) downsized and streamlined our Mexico operations throughout 2024. We continue to evaluate our global factory footprint to identify ways to operate more efficiently.
With regard to the potential for recent tariff activities related to our products sourced globally, our global supply chain team is actively monitoring, reviewing and assessing any potential impact to our products and supply chain across the world. We have strategically developed a global manufacturing footprint to enhance efficiency and mitigate risks associated with international trade policies to better serve our global customer base.
Even though we operate one factory in the PRC, one factory in Vietnam and manufacturing and assembly plants in Mexico and Brazil, respectively, we continue to evaluate additional third-party manufacturers and sources of supply. During 2024, we utilized multiple third-party manufacturers and maintained duplicate tooling for certain of our products. Where possible, we utilize standard parts and components, which are available from multiple sources.
We are a large consumer of integrated circuits, including low-power, RF chips and modules that are used throughout our products. We continually seek additional sources to reduce our dependence on our integrated circuit suppliers. To further manage our integrated system on a chip supplier dependence, we include microcontroller technology which incorporates non-volatile, reprogrammable flash memory in most of our products. Flash memory-based microcontrollers have shorter lead times than microcontrollers using other memory technologies and may be reprogrammed. This allows us flexibility to use a given component on many different products, has the added benefit of potentially reducing excess and obsolete inventory exposure and allows us to update our product functionality in the field. This diversification lessens our dependence on any one supplier and allows us to negotiate more favorable terms. Our largest integrated circuit supplier, Qorvo International Pte Ltd., provided 11.5% of our total inventory purchases in 2022. We did not have any suppliers that represented over 10% of our inventory purchases in 2024 or 2023.
Our manufacturing process consists of plastic injection molding, keypad molding, coating or painting, surface mount technology, assembly, software programming, functional testing, packaging, and quality control. We conduct operations utilizing a formal, documented quality management system to ensure that our products and services satisfy customer needs and expectations. Our manufacturing facilities are certified to the ISO 9001:2015 International Standard for quality management. Testing and quality control are applied to components, parts, sub-assemblies and systems obtained from third-party suppliers. Our manufacturing facility in Yangzhou, PRC is certified to the TL 9000 Standard, which is the telecom industry's unique extension to ISO 9001:2015. All of our manufacturing facilities are certified to the ISO 14001:2015 International Standard for environmental management systems. In addition, our manufacturing facilities in Vietnam, Mexico and Yangzhou, PRC have also achieved ISO 45001 International Standard for safety and health management systems.
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We are focused on reducing the environmental impact of our operations. Our manufacturing facility in Yangzhou, PRC hosts an on-site solar renewable energy system and we are evaluating the use of renewable energy in other locations. Our teams continue to examine practices and processes throughout our facilities to identify opportunities for greater energy efficiency. Each of our manufacturing facilities has standing policies and targets for the monitoring and management of waste generation and energy consumption and is focused on reducing electricity consumption, water usage and greenhouse gas emissions. In April 2024, we signed our Commitment Letter to the Science Based Targets Initiative ("SBTi"), showcasing our dedication to establishing an approved science based target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
We are committed to complying with applicable labor laws and regulations of the countries in which we operate and supporting ethical labor practices that do not infringe on human rights. We are a regular member of the Responsible Business Alliance ("RBA"), an industry coalition dedicated to driving sustainable value for workers in global supply chains, among other things. As a regular member of the RBA, we have adopted the RBA Code of Conduct, which establishes standards to ensure that working conditions are safe, that employees are treated with respect and dignity and that business operations are environmentally responsible and conducted ethically. The RBA Code of Conduct has been reflected in our employee policies and procedures. We conduct regular internal audits in line with RBA and have engaged in third-party Sedex Members Ethical Trade Audits ("SMETA") and RBA audits in our factories and regularly monitor ethics-related key performance indicators. In July 2024, our manufacturing facility in Vietnam successfully completed the RBA Validated Assessment Program ("VAP") audit achieving a Silver VAP Recognition Level.
Our Human Rights Due Diligence procedure incorporates international labor and human rights standards, as well the RBA Code of Conduct, into our social and ethical management systems. This includes evaluating and addressing human rights concerns in our supply chain. We follow RBA guidelines for the supplier risk assessment process. We require all major suppliers, as defined by the RBA, to complete the RBA self-assessment questionnaire. We engage third-party due diligence platforms to screen major suppliers for sustainability and ethics concerns. As part of our Quality Management System, we conduct on-site audits of our suppliers, as a part of our supplier onboarding and annual recertification process, to ensure quality and compliance across our supply chain. A key component of these audits is evaluating alignment with the RBA VAP Standard. Based on the results of these risk assessments, we require that 50% of high-risk suppliers complete an on-site third-party RBA VAP audit. We require suppliers to adhere to our Global Supplier Code of Conduct ("Supplier Code of Conduct"), which is available on our website. Our Supplier Code of Conduct sets forth our global expectations in the areas of fair dealing, legal compliance, business integrity, labor practices, health and safety and environmental management. Among other things, we require our suppliers to respect human rights and to not engage in any form of involuntary or forced labor and to fully comply with all laws and regulations pertaining to the appropriate and dignified treatment of all workers.
Our Global Human Rights Policy is aligned with internationally recognized human rights principles defined by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. We provide training to all employees to help identify and report any signs of forced labor or other unlawful labor practices. We have a third-party confidential ethics hotline ("the UEI Ethics Line") to enable our employees or other stakeholders to anonymously report any suspected violations of applicable laws, policies or human rights violations. We are committed to investigating all communications received on the UEI Ethics Line.
Government Regulation and Environmental Matters
Many of our products are subject to various federal, state, local and international laws governing chemical substances in products, including laws regulating the manufacturing and distribution of chemical substances and laws restricting the presence of certain substances in electronics products. We may incur substantial costs, including cleanup costs, fines and civil or criminal sanctions, third-party damages, or personal injury claims, if we were to violate or become liable under environmental laws or if our products become non-compliant with environmental laws. We also face increasing complexity in our product design and procurement operations as we adjust to new and future requirements relating to the material composition of our products.
We may also face significant costs and liabilities in connection with product take-back and "right to repair" legislation both in the U.S. and abroad. For example, the European Union's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment ("WEEE") Directive makes producers of electrical goods financially responsible for specified collection, recycling, treatment, and disposal of past and future covered products. Our European subsidiaries are WEEE compliant.
We believe that we have materially complied with all currently existing international and domestic federal, state and local statutes and regulations regarding environmental standards and occupational safety and health matters to which we are subject. During the years ended December 31, 2024, 2023 and 2022, the costs incurred in complying with federal, state, local and foreign statutes and regulations pertaining to environmental standards and occupational safety and health laws and regulations
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did not materially affect our earnings, financial condition or competitive position. In addition, during the same period, the costs incurred in complying with other applicable government regulations likewise did not materially affect our earnings, financial condition or competitive position. However, due to the heightened awareness of corporate environmental, social and governance ("ESG") matters and evolving laws and regulations or enforcement policies, increases in compliance costs may have a material adverse effect upon our capital expenditures, earnings or financial condition.
We are committed to reducing and eliminating substances of concern from our products and manufacturing process. Our products distributed in the European Union are compliant with the RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive 2011/65/EU and 2015/863/EU) and REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals) directives. In other regions, we also need to comply with our customers' specific requirements relating to the non-use of certain hazardous substances in the products, which are typically equally or more stringent than the RoHS directive. We have a dedicated "Green Team" comprised of engineers and environmental regulation experts, that analyze our products, processes, and raw materials to help ensure that we comply with environmental and government regulations worldwide, as well as the applicable "Green" requirements imposed by our customers. Additionally, we have in-house testing capability to help ensure product compliance. We place great importance on the compliance with local health and safety laws and regulations. At our manufacturing facilities, we are also committed to protecting our workers from exposure to hazardous substances under an established health and safety management system. As an example, we have replaced volatile organic compounds ("VOC") emitting inks and paints with reduced-VOC paints at some of our manufacturing facilities.
We strive to extend the useful life of our products and reduce our products' impact on the environment. We have invested in R&D to improve the energy efficiency of our battery-operated products. For example, we deploy a low energy IR-engine in some of our products, which can extend battery life regardless of the protocols utilized by the product. We have introduced our control platform and related technologies that address the growing demand for sustainable products that reduce energy use and eliminate waste. With this platform, we partnered with technology leaders and invested in bringing ultra-low power connectivity chips with built-in energy harvesting and photovoltaic cells to the market. These chips offer more computing power while consuming substantially less battery power. In addition, to reduce energy consumption even further, we have introduced solutions powered by low-light solar cells for the entertainment remote control and IoT markets.
We also offer a product refurbishment program to our customers where we reclaim, refurbish and recycle pre-owned remote controls. Under this program, major components in pre-owned remote control units are reused or recycled. For example, the printed circuit board assemblies ("PCBA") are cleaned, tested and reused, or plastics are reground to be reused. We have also employed new master carton packing methods to increase shipping efficiency and reduce cardboard usage. Some of our manufacturing facilities are switching to the use of recycled solder. To further reduce collateral waste, we have introduced an initiative to reduce and/or remove single use plastics ("SUP") from our supply chain and manufacturing process for certain customer programs.
In the nations where we have operations or otherwise conduct business, we are also subject to tariffs, import/export controls, and other trade-related laws and limitations. These limits, regulations, and tariffs, especially those pertaining to or affecting relations between the United States and the PRC, might significantly disrupt our business, affecting our capacity to manufacture, source components and sell goods. The new U.S. administration has introduced new policies imposing additional tariffs on goods manufactured abroad, including goods manufactured in the PRC and Mexico. As of the date of this filing, the new tariffs on Mexico goods have been paused; however, significant uncertainty continues to exist about the future of U.S. trade policy and the implementation of new tariffs, including but not limited to, new tariffs on goods manufactured in the PRC and Mexico. These measures, if fully implemented, will increase costs for certain goods imported into the United States.
Climate Change
Our operations, supply chain and products are expected to become increasingly subject to federal, state, local and foreign laws, regulations, and international treaties relating to climate change, such as climate disclosure, carbon pricing or product energy efficiency requirements. We have established an executive-level Environmental Working Group to further integrate environmental considerations throughout the product lifecycle, ensure compliance with environmental regulations and customer requirements, implement sustainable practices in our operations, reduce our product's environmental footprint, and deliver more cost-effective and lower carbon technology solutions to our customers. We believe that technology will be fundamental to finding solutions to achieve compliance with and manage those requirements. Our Board of Directors (the "Board"), specifically the Corporate Governance, Sustainability and Nominating Committee, is responsible for risk oversight, which includes relevant environmental-related risks such as climate change.
Government regulations are subject to change; therefore, we are unable to predict the impact of complying with potential future requirements or whether doing so will materially affect our operations, financial situation or business.
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Human Capital
As of December 31, 2024, we employed 3,838 members of staff across our worldwide facilities. Of this staff, 2,928 are associated with our manufacturing and supply chain organizations in the PRC, Vietnam, Mexico and Brazil. Beyond the manufacturing and supply chain organizations, 542 of staff work in engineering and R&D, 105 in sales, marketing, consumer service and support and 263 in executive and administrative functions.
Additionally, in the PRC, as is standard practice, we work with third-party agencies who have recruited and provided us with workers to support our production activities. These third-party agencies have been required to adhere to both the relevant RBA Code of Conduct requirements and our own Supplier Code of Conduct, which among other things, prohibits the use of forced labor and sets forth requirements on fair dealing, legal compliance, business integrity, labor practices, health and safety and environmental management. We have also standardized the qualification, contract and monitoring standards for all third-party agencies.
Employee Recruitment, Retention, and Development
We provide and maintain a work environment that is designed to attract, develop and retain top talent through offering our employees an engaging work experience that contributes to their career development. We recognize that our success is based on the collective talents and dedication of those we employ. Talent management is critical to our ability to execute our long-term growth strategy, and we utilize both internal human resource personnel and external recruiting firms to identify and attract such talent. Through our history of technological innovation, we appreciate the importance of retention, growth and development of our employees. We regularly collect feedback from employees to better understand and improve their experiences and identify opportunities to continually strengthen our culture. Due to the nature of our activities, we tend to heavily invest in engineering capital, employing highly skilled and specialized engineers and technicians in the areas of electronics, RF design, software, cloud, mechanical, industrial design, manufacturing and quality disciplines.
Our staff is located around the globe at different office and development locations. Our R&D locations are as follows:
•advanced engineering, architecture and cloud teams are located in Santa Ana, California, and Scottsdale, Arizona;
•cloud architecture, software and service teams are located in Santa Ana and San Mateo, California;
•sensor engineering and R&D teams are located in Carlsbad and Poway, California;
•connected thermostat engineering and R&D teams are located in Santa Ana and Poway, California;
•hardware engineering teams are located in Panyu and Suzhou in the PRC;
•software, firmware and device database teams are located in Bangalore, India; and
•a software services team focused on support software solutions is located in Plymouth, Minnesota.
Next to these specialized centers of excellence, we employ engineering, sales and marketing and support staff in many of our regional offices in the United States, The Netherlands, Hong Kong, the PRC, Brazil, India, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Mexico.
Inclusion, Ethics Line and Code of Conduct
We are an Equal Opportunity Employer and are committed to providing a workplace free of discrimination, harassment and retaliation for all employees and we value equality, opportunity and respect. We encourage any employee who believes they are the subject of discrimination, harassment or retaliation to express concerns without fear of retribution or retaliation to their immediate supervisors, any senior-level managers, or through the UEI Ethics Line. In addition, we have maintained and enforced a Code of Conduct that applies to all of our employees, including our Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and Principal Accounting Officer, and to each member of the Board. The Code of Conduct is available in the Investor Relations section of our website (UEI.com/investor) by clicking on "Investor", then "Governance" and then "Committee composition, documents and confidential ethics line". We intend to post on that website any future changes or amendments to our Code of Conduct, and any waiver of our Code of Conduct that applies to any of our executive officers or a member of our Board within four business days following the date of the amendment or waiver.
Labor unions represent approximately 12.0% of our 3,838 employees as of December 31, 2024. Some of these unionized workers are employed in Monterrey, Mexico, and are represented under contract with the Sindicato Industrial de Trabajadores de Nuevo León adherido a la Federación Nacional de Sindicatos Independientes. Unionized workers, employed in Manaus, Brazil, are represented under contract with the Sindicato dos Trabalhadores nas Industrias Metalugicas, Mecanicas e de Materiais Eletricos de Manaus. Additionally, workers at our Vietnam facility are covered by a collective bargaining agreement.
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These workers represent approximately 17.0% of our 3,838 employees as of December 31, 2024. Our business units are subject to various laws and regulations relating to their relationships with their employees. These laws and regulations are specific to the location of each business unit. We believe that our relationships with employees and their representative organizations are good.
Safety, Health and Wellness
The health and safety of our employees, contractors, visitors and the communities in which we operate is paramount. We are committed to reducing or eliminating health and safety risks through our health and safety programs, including effective control measures, emergency response plans and training programs. We continually monitor and evaluate health and safety performance against established goals and industry standards and maintain clear procedures for collecting information about health and safety incidents, near misses, and concerns. Each incident is thoroughly investigated, and corrective actions are taken to prevent their recurrence. These metrics are communicated to leadership through regular management reviews. This commitment is outlined in our global health and safety policy. As a member of RBA, we also adhere to the standards of the RBA Code of Conduct to ensure working conditions are safe throughout our supply chain.
Seasonality
Historically, our business has been influenced by the retail sales cycle, with increased sales in the second half of the year. We expect this pattern to be repeated during 2025.
Information About Our Executive Officers
The following table sets forth certain information concerning our executive officers on March 11, 2025:
Name Age Position
Paul D. Arling 62 Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer
Bryan M. Hackworth 55 Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
Ramzi S. Ammari 59 Senior Vice President, Corporate Planning and Strategy
Richard K. Carnifax 38 Senior Vice President, Global Operations
David Chong 63 Executive Vice President, Global Sales
Paul D. Arling is our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. He joined us in May 1996 as Chief Financial Officer and was named to our Board of Directors in August 1996. He was appointed President and Chief Operating Officer in September 1998, was promoted to Chief Executive Officer in October 2000 and appointed as Chairman in July 2001. At the 2024 Annual Meeting of Stockholders, Mr. Arling was re-elected as our Chairman to serve until the 2025 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. From 1993 through May 1996, he served in various capacities at LESCO, Inc., a manufacturer and distributor of professional turf care products. Prior to LESCO, he worked for Imperial Wallcoverings, a manufacturer and distributor of wall covering products as Director of Planning, and The Michael Allen Company, a strategic management consulting company where he was employed as a management consultant. Mr. Arling received his Bachelor of Science and Master of Business Administration from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Bryan M. Hackworth is our Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. He was promoted to Chief Financial Officer in August 2006. Mr. Hackworth joined us in June 2004 as Corporate Controller and subsequently assumed the role of Chief Accounting Officer in May 2005. Before joining us in 2004, he spent five years at Mars, Inc., a privately held international manufacturer and distributor of consumer products and served in several financial and strategic roles. Prior to joining Mars, Inc., Mr. Hackworth spent six years at Deloitte & Touche LLP as an auditor, specializing in the manufacturing and retail industries. Mr. Hackworth is a certified public accountant (inactive) in the state of California and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from University of California, Irvine.
Ramzi S. Ammari is our Senior Vice President, Corporate Planning and Strategy. He joined us in June 1997 as a Project Manager and has held various positions of increasing responsibility within our organization until being named to his current position in October 2013. He has global responsibility for the Company's technology innovation roadmap; driving new product initiatives; directing and implementing strategic partnerships, joint ventures and acquisitions; and recommending new avenues for business creation. Prior to joining us, Mr. Ammari worked at Mitsubishi Consumer Electronics of America for four years as
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Business Planning Manager where he was responsible for introducing the first flat-screen plasma display panel television for the North America market. He received his Bachelor of Science, Engineering degree in 1989 and, subsequently, a Master of Business Administration from University of California, Irvine in 1993.
Richard K. Carnifax is our Senior Vice President, Global Operations. He joined us in May 2020 as Vice President, Global Supply Chain and in July 2022, he was promoted to Vice President, Operations. In February 2023, he was promoted to his current position. Prior to joining us, from March 2019 until May 2020, Mr. Carnifax was the Chief Operating Officer at Cast Nylons, a privately held manufacturer and distributor of cast nylon stock shapes and custom cast parts, and was Vice President, Operations at Cast Nylons from November 2017 until March 2019. From November 2015 until September 2017, he held various operational roles at Air Enterprises, a privately held manufacturer of specialty air handling equipment. Prior to joining Air Enterprises, Mr. Carnifax spent four years scheduling and planning materials for Howden, a provider of high-quality air and gas handling products and services to the power, oil and gas, mining and petrochemical industries. Mr. Carnifax holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and a Master of Arts in International Relations/Business from the University of Akron.
David Chong is our Executive Vice President, Global Sales. He was previously responsible for the general management and sales of our Asia region and was promoted to his current position in October 2023. Mr. Chong joined us in January 2009 as Senior Vice President of Global OEM Sales. Prior to joining us, Mr. Chong served as Senior Vice President at Philips Consumer Electronics Division and as the Chief Marketing Officer of the business group Philips Display (Philips TV and computer monitor business). At Philips Display, he led the re-engineering of the Product Creation, Marketing and Sales Organization to compete successfully in the LCD TV space. Prior to this, he also served as Vice President and General Manager of the Audio Video Business in Asia, Vice President and Global Business Line Manager for Audio and various senior management positions at Philips' CE Division. Mr. Chong started at Philips Research Lab in 1984 as a research scientist working in the area of VLSI design methodologies. He also served as Managing Director for Asia at InVue Security Product before joining us. Mr. Chong had his senior education in the United Kingdom, holding a Bachelor of Science in Electrical and Electronics Engineering with High Honors from University of Nottingham.
Richard A. Firehammer, Jr., Esq. is our Senior Vice President, General Counsel, Head of Global Compliance, and Corporate Secretary. He joined us in October 1993 as General Counsel. He became our Corporate Secretary in February 1994. He was our Vice President from May 1997 until August 1998, and served as counsel to us from September 1998 until February 1999, at which time he was promoted to Senior Vice President. In January 2022, in addition to his duties as General Counsel and Secretary, he took on the added responsibilities as Head of Global Compliance. From November 1992 to September 1993, he was associated with the Chicago, Illinois law firm, Shefsky & Froelich, Ltd. From 1987 to 1992, he was with the law firm Vedder, Price, Kaufman & Kammholz in Chicago, Illinois. He received his Bachelor of Science in Accounting from Indiana University and a Juris Doctor degree from Whittier College School of Law. Mr. Firehammer is also a certified public accountant (inactive).
ITEM 1A. RISK FACTORS
Forward-Looking Statements
We make forward-looking statements in Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations and elsewhere in this report based on the beliefs and assumptions of our management and on information currently available to us. Forward-looking statements include information about our possible or assumed future results of operations, which follow under the headings "Business", "Liquidity and Capital Resources", and other statements throughout this report preceded by, followed by or that include the words "believes", "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "plans", "estimates" or similar expressions. Any number of risks and uncertainties could cause actual results to differ materially from those we express in our forward-looking statements, including the risks and uncertainties we describe below and other factors we describe from time to time in our periodic filings with the SEC. We therefore caution you not to rely unduly on any forward-looking statement. The forward-looking statements in this report speak only as of the date of this report, and we undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future developments, or otherwise.
Risks and Uncertainties
We are subject to various risks that could materially and adversely affect our business, results of operations, cash flows, liquidity, or financial condition which make an investment in our securities risky. You should understand that these risks could, in circumstances we may or may not be able to accurately predict, recognize, or control, have a material adverse effect on our business, growth, reputation, prospects, financial condition, operating results (including components of our financial results), cash flows, liquidity and stock price. In addition, these risks could cause results to differ materially from those we express in forward-looking statements contained in this report or in other Company communications, including those we file from time to
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time with the SEC. These risk factors do not identify all risks that we face; our operations could also be affected by factors, events, or uncertainties that are not presently known to us or that we currently do not consider to present significant risks to our operations. Although the risks are organized by headings, and each risk is discussed separately, many are interrelated. Because there is no way to determine in advance whether, or to what extent, any present uncertainty will ultimately impact our business, you should give equal weight to each of the following:
Risks Relating to Economic Conditions and Global Events
General political and economic factors beyond our control could adversely affect our business and results of operations. These factors include, but are not limited to, supply chain disruptions, labor shortages, wage pressures, geo-political matters and conflicts, rising inflation and potential economic slowdown or recession, as well as increases in costs including fuel and energy costs, foreign currency exchange rate fluctuations, tariffs, and other matters that influence consumer spending and preferences. Among other events, the invasion of Ukraine by Russia has escalated tensions among the United States, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization ("NATO") and Russia. Conflict in the Middle East has led to disruption of international shipping lanes, causing shipping delays and fluctuating freight costs. These conflicts and the resulting sanctions and related countermeasures could lead to market disruptions, including significant volatility in commodity prices, credit and capital markets, and supply chain interruptions. Additionally, they have the potential to spread to or exacerbate tensions in other countries or regions, leading to new and unanticipated disruptions.
Global markets continued to face threats and uncertain economic and financial market conditions that may also adversely affect the financial condition of our customers, suppliers and other business partners. Any significant decrease in customers' purchases of our products or our inability to collect accounts receivable resulting from an adverse impact of the global markets on customers' financial condition could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. Additionally, disruptions in financial markets could reduce our access to debt capital markets, negatively affecting our ability to implement our business strategy.
On February 1, 2025, substantial tariffs on Canada, the PRC and Mexico were announced. There exists substantial uncertainty as to whether these tariffs will be fully implemented or sustained. We are monitoring these actions, which could have an adverse impact on our business strategy, operating results and financial condition. There can be no assurances that these tariffs will not be implemented or increased in the future, with the previously mentioned countries or additional countries with which we do business. The degree to which these changes in U.S. trade policy affect our operating results will be influenced by the specific details of the changes in trade policies, their timing and duration, and our effectiveness in deploying tools and strategies to address these issues. In addition, retaliatory tariffs imposed by other countries or other potential government actions, could result in further adverse impacts on our business strategy, operating results and financial condition.
Risks Relating to Operations
Cybersecurity Issues: Cybersecurity Incidents, Failure to Maintain the Integrity of and Protect Internal or Customer Data May Result in Faulty Business Decisions, Operational Inefficiencies, Damage to our Reputation and/or Subject Us to Costs, Fines, or Lawsuits
Our business requires collection, processing, and retention of large volumes of data, including personally identifiable information of our customers in various information systems that we maintain and in those maintained by third parties with whom we contract, including in areas such as customer product servicing, human resources outsourcing, website hosting, and various forms of electronic communications. We and third parties who provide services to us also maintain personally identifiable information about our employees. The integrity and protection of that customer, employee, and company data, including proprietary information, is critical to us. If that data is inaccurate or incomplete or inaccessible, we may make faulty decisions or experience business interruptions. Despite the security measures we have in place, our facilities and systems, and those of the retailers, dealers, licensees and other third-party suppliers and vendors with which we do business, may be vulnerable to cybersecurity threats, attacks or incidents, failures or disruptions, acts of vandalism or misconduct, computer viruses, misplaced or lost data, programming and/or human errors or other similar events. Any cybersecurity incidents involving the misappropriation, loss or other unauthorized disclosure of customer, employee, supplier or Company information, whether caused by us, an unknown third party, or the retailers, dealers, licensees or other third-party suppliers and vendors with which we do business, could result in losses, severely damage our reputation, expose us to the risks of litigation and liability, disrupt our operations and have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations and financial condition. As cybersecurity threats may evolve in sophistication and become more prevalent worldwide, we continue to aim to increase our sensitivity and attention to these threats, seek additional investments and resources to address these threats and enhance the security of our facilities and systems and strengthen our controls and procedures to monitor, protect against and mitigate these threats. The domestic and international legal and regulatory environment related to information security, data collection and privacy is increasingly rigorous and complex, with new and constantly changing requirements applicable to our business.
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Compliance with these requirements, including the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation ("GDPR"), China's newly enacted Personal Information Protection Law ("PIPL") and other domestic (including state law) and international regulations, could result in additional costs and changes to our business practices.
Moreover, we rely heavily on computer systems and software to manage and operate our business, record and process transactions, and manage, support and communicate with our employees, customers, suppliers, vendors, and other third parties. Computer systems and software are important to production planning, finance, company operations and customer service, among other business-critical processes. Despite our efforts to prevent disruptions to our computer systems and software, these systems and software may be affected by damage, disruption, attack, or interruption from, among other causes, power outages, system failures, computer viruses, the development of harmful malware or ransomware, denial-of-service attacks and other intrusions, including cybersecurity incidents and other disruptions or failures. Cybersecurity threat actors also may attempt to exploit vulnerabilities through software that is commonly used by companies in cloud-based services and bundled software. Computer hardware and storage equipment that is integral to efficient operations, such as email, telephone and other functionality, is concentrated in certain physical locations in the various continents in which we operate. We rely on software applications, enterprise cloud storage systems and cloud computing services provided by third-party vendors, and our business may be adversely affected by service disruptions in or cybersecurity incidents and disruptions and failures related to such systems. Remote work and remote access to our systems has increased, which also increases the risk of cybersecurity incidents and disruptions and failures on our systems surface. In addition, there has been a global increase in cybersecurity threat volume, frequency, and sophistication driven by the global enablement of remote workforces. Geopolitical tensions or conflicts, such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, may further heighten the risk of cybersecurity incidents and disruptions of our services and software on which we rely. We continue to try to mitigate these risks in a number of ways, including through additional investment, engagement of third-party experts and consultants, improving the security of our facilities and systems (including through upgrades to our security and information technology systems), providing training for all employees (with more enhanced or frequent training based on role or responsibility), assessing the continued appropriateness of relevant insurance coverage and strengthening our controls and procedures to monitor, mitigate and respond appropriately to these threats. We carry cyber insurance, and while we have not incurred any material losses due to any failure of or disruptions to our systems, or from any cybersecurity incidents, we cannot be certain that our coverage will be adequate for liabilities actually incurred, that insurance will continue to be available to us on economically reasonable terms, or that any insurer will not deny coverage as to any future claim.
As part of our QuickSet Cloud feature delivery, our cloud data captures device information and data elements that are used to enhance product performance and create a more personalized consumer experience. These features, and any device specific data are delivered for use by our customers and not sold to third parties. While QuickSet Cloud services a subset of the data used by QuickSet, the majority of the data is captured, analyzed and stored on the device, and in the home, and is not stored outside of the home. This includes the more personal and private data classes such as content usage and user occupancy and presence.
Proprietary Technologies
We produce highly complex products that incorporate leading-edge technology, including hardware, firmware, and software. Firmware and software may contain bugs that may unexpectedly interfere with product operation. There can be no assurance that our testing programs will detect all defects in individual products or defects that may affect numerous shipments. The presence of defects may harm customer satisfaction, reduce sales opportunities, or increase warranty claims and/or returns. An inability to cure or repair such a defect may result in the failure of a product line, temporary or permanent withdrawal of a product or market, damage to our reputation, increased inventory costs, or product re-engineering expenses, any of which may have a material impact on our operating results, financial condition and cash flows.
Technology Changes in Control and Sensing
We currently derive substantial revenue from the sale of remote controls, thermostats, sensors and home automation products based on IR and RF and other technologies. Other control technologies exist or may be developed that may compete with our technology. In addition, we develop and maintain our own database of IR and RF codes, as well as elements critical to the delivery of our HVAC engine. There are other IR and RF libraries offered by companies that we compete with in the marketplace. In addition, if competing control and sensing technology and products gain acceptance and start to be integrated into home electronics devices and home security and automation products, demand for our products may decrease, resulting in decreased operating results, financial condition and cash flows.
Our Technology Development Activities May Experience Delays
We may experience technical, financial, resource or other difficulties or delays related to the further development of our technologies. Delays may have adverse financial effects and may allow competitors to gain an advantage over us in the marketplace or in the standards setting arena. There can be no assurance that we will continue to have adequate staffing or that our development efforts will ultimately be successful. Moreover, certain of our technologies have not been fully tested in
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commercial use, and it is possible that they may not perform as expected. In such cases, our business, financial condition and operating results may be adversely affected, and our ability to secure new licensees and other business opportunities may be diminished.
Dependence upon New Product Introduction
Our ability to remain competitive in the video services, consumer electronics, climate control, security, home automation and home appliance markets will depend considerably upon our ability to successfully identify new product opportunities, as well as develop and introduce these products and enhancements on a timely and cost effective basis. There can be no assurance that we will be successful at developing and marketing new products or enhancing our existing products, or that these new or enhanced products will achieve consumer acceptance and, if achieved, will sustain that acceptance. In addition, there can be no assurance that products developed by others will not render our products non-competitive or obsolete or that we will be able to obtain or maintain the rights to use proprietary technologies developed by others which are incorporated in our products. Any failure to anticipate or respond adequately to technological developments and customer requirements, or any significant delays in product development or introduction, may have a material adverse effect on our operating results, financial condition and cash flows. Moreover, the introduction of new products may require significant expenditures for R&D, tooling, manufacturing processes, inventory and marketing. In order to achieve high-volume production of any new product, we may have to make substantial investments in inventory and expand our production capabilities. We cannot be certain that we will recover the costs we incurred in developing new products, investing in inventory, expanding our production capabilities, or that those new products will be successful.
Artificial Intelligence
We incorporate artificial intelligence ("AI") solutions into some of our platforms, offerings, services and features, and these applications may become more important in our operations over time. Our competitors, or other third parties, may incorporate AI into their products more quickly or more successfully than us, which could impair our ability to compete effectively and affect our results or operations. Additionally, if our AI applications are based on data, algorithms, or other inputs that are flawed, or if they assist in producing content, analyses, or recommendations that are or are alleged to be deficient, inaccurate, or biased, our business, financial condition, and results of operations may be adversely affected. The use of AI applications has resulted in, and may in the future result in, cybersecurity incidents that implicate the personal data of end users of such applications. Any such cybersecurity incidents related to our use of AI applications could adversely affect our reputation and results of operations. AI also presents emerging ethical issues, and if our use of AI becomes controversial, we may experience brand reputational, or competitive harm, or legal liability. The rapid evolution of AI, including the potential regulation of AI by government or other regulatory agencies, will require significant resources to develop, test, and maintain our platforms, offerings, services, and features in order to implement AI ethically and minimize any unintended, harmful impacts.
Dependence on Consumer Preference
We are susceptible to fluctuations in our business based upon consumer demand for our products. We cannot guarantee that increases in demand for our products associated with increases in the deployment of new technology will continue. We believe that our success depends on our ability to anticipate, gauge and respond to fluctuations in consumer preferences. However, it is impossible to predict with complete accuracy the occurrence and effect of fluctuations in consumer demand over a product's life cycle. Moreover, any growth in revenues that we achieve may be transitory and should not be relied upon as an indication of future performance.
Dependence on Major Customers
The economic strength and weakness of our worldwide customers affect our performance. We sell our products, accessory products, and proprietary technologies to video service providers, OEMs, retailers and private label customers. We also supply our products, accessory products, and technologies to our wholly owned, non-U.S. subsidiaries and to independent foreign distributors, who in turn distribute our products worldwide. While we generally have a broad and varied customer base, during the years ended December 31, 2024, 2023 and 2022, Daikin Industries Ltd. accounted for sales totaling more than 10% of our net sales. During the year ended December 31, 2022, Comcast Corporation also accounted for sales totaling more than 10% of our net sales. In addition to these customers, we have some customers that, individually or through their subsidiaries or affiliated partners, purchase a large amount of products from us. Although our broad distribution channels help to minimize the impact of the loss of any one customer, the loss of any of these large individual customers, or our inability to maintain order volume with these customers, may have an adverse effect on our sales, operating results, financial condition and cash flows.
Demand for Consumer Service and Support
We provide consumer service and support to our retail customers to add overall value and to help differentiate us from our competitors. Certain of our products have more features than others and therefore require more end-user technical support, which may increase our support costs and have an adverse effect on our business, operating results, financial condition and cash
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flows. We continually review our service and support group and are marketing our expertise in this area to other potential retail customers.
Manufacturing Risks
We operate factories in the PRC, Vietnam, Mexico and Brazil. In addition, we utilize third-party manufacturers located in Asia to manufacture a portion of our products. We believe that the loss of any one or more of these third-party manufacturers would not have a long-term material adverse effect on our business, results of operations and cash flows, because numerous other manufacturers are available to fulfill our requirements; however, the loss of any of our major third-party manufacturers may adversely affect our business, operating results, financial condition and cash flows until alternative manufacturing arrangements are secured.
U.S.-China Trade and Supply Chain Compliance Risks
In recent years, U.S.-China trade and investment has become subject to additional regulatory conditions and restrictions, including restrictions on certain imports and exports, increased tariffs, inbound and outbound investment restrictions, and enhanced prohibitions targeting the use of forced labor in supply chains. Political leaders, regulatory agencies and legislators have also increased their focus on enforcing these rules and monitoring companies’ compliance. We maintain policies and procedures designed to ensure compliance with these rules, and we do not believe that these rules or our efforts to comply with them materially impact our business, but it is possible that these restrictions, tariffs and related government initiatives will expand and that their effect our business will become more onerous, and we cannot be certain that our compliance efforts will in all cases be successful.
In the United States, among other relevant restrictions, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (the "UFLPA") creates a rebuttable presumption that all goods produced or manufactured, even partially, in the PRC’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region ("XUAR") were made with forced labor and, therefore, would not be allowed entry at U.S. ports. Importers are required to present clear and convincing evidence that goods from the XUAR are not made with forced labor. While we do not authorize the sourcing of any product from the XUAR and have increased actions to ensure our entire supply chain is free of any products made with forced labor, there is nonetheless a risk, particularly in light of prior media allegations and government inquiries focusing on one of our former facilities, that our business, results of operations and financial condition could be adversely affected by the UFLPA, related regulatory requirements and enforcement activity, or related customer concerns. Overall, our reliance on international supply chains involves a risk of adverse effects to our business, including from government restrictions and enforcement efforts.
Among other things, we utilize third-party suppliers as well as third-party employment or labor agencies to provide us with staff to support our production activities. While we require these suppliers and agencies to adhere to our Supplier Code of Conduct and the RBA Code of Conduct, which among other things prohibits forced labor in any manner and requires them to treat all employees with respect and dignity, use of third-party agencies has come under worldwide scrutiny. If a supplier or third-party labor agency were to engage in actual or apparent non-compliance with our Supplier Code of Conduct or otherwise violate applicable laws or regulations, this could create compliance challenges for us and adversely affect our business or our customer relationships.
Dependence upon Key Suppliers
We continue to operate in a supply-constrained environment, and we are heavily dependent on third-party suppliers and their ability to deliver sufficient quantities of key components and products at reasonable prices and in time for us to meet schedules for the delivery of our products and services. Most of the components used in our products are available from multiple sources. However, we purchase ICs used in products, from a small number of key suppliers. To reduce our dependence on our IC suppliers we continually seek additional sources. We maintain inventories of our ICs, which may be used in part to mitigate, but not eliminate, delays resulting from supply interruptions. Further, we have identified alternative sources of supply for our ICs, component parts, and finished goods; however, there can be no assurance that we will be able to continue to obtain these inventory purchases on a timely basis or in the quantities we need. Any extended interruption, shortage or termination in the supply of any of the components used in our products, or a reduction in their quality or reliability, or a significant increase in prices of components, would have an adverse effect on our operating results, financial position and cash flows.
From time to time, we may obtain components from a single source due to technology, availability, price, quality or other considerations. New products that we introduce may utilize custom components obtained initially from only one source until we have determined whether there is a need for additional suppliers. Replacing a single-source supplier could delay production of some products as replacement suppliers may be subject to capacity constraints or other output limitations. For some components, alternative sources may not exist or may be unable to produce the quantities necessary to satisfy our requirements. The loss of, deterioration of our relationship with, or limits in allocation by, a single-source supplier, could adversely affect our business and financial performance.
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Difficulty in Ordering Integrated Circuits and Increases in Commodities and Freight Costs Have Adversely Affected and Will Continue to Adversely Affect Our Business
We have experienced difficulty in ordering ICs in the recent past and this difficulty could continue in the future. While we have identified other sources of ICs and are taking other production and inventory control steps in order to mitigate the effects caused by these types of shortages, we cannot guarantee that the alternative sources will meet our short- and longer-term IC needs and/or without experiencing increases in the prices we pay for these components. If we are not able to purchase sufficient quantities of ICs from our current and alternative suppliers, we may not be able to produce sufficient quantities of products to meet our customers' demands. This, in turn, may affect our ability to meet our quarterly revenue targets and otherwise adversely affect our business. In addition, many of our products are paired with certain of our customers' products, like set-top boxes and televisions. If those customers are not able to obtain sufficient quantities of ICs for their products, their demand for our products may decrease. Also, we are continuing to experience increases in freight costs which have and may continue to adversely affect our margins. At the same time, in order to secure components for our products or services, we have and may continue to make advance payments to suppliers and/or enter into non-cancelable commitments with suppliers. We have and may continue to strategically purchase ICs and other key components in advance of demand to take advantage of favorable pricing or to address concerns about future availability. If we fail to anticipate customer demand properly or if customer changes its demand significantly, a temporary "oversupply" could result in excess or obsolete components.
Transportation Costs and Impact of Oil Prices
We ship products from our factories and foreign manufacturers via ocean and air transport. It is sometimes difficult to forecast swings in demand or delays in production and, as a result, products may be shipped via air which is more costly than ocean shipments. We typically cannot recover the increased cost of air freight from our customers. Additionally, tariffs and other export fees may be incurred to ship products from foreign manufacturers to the customer. These increases in costs and tariffs may have a material adverse effect on our product margins. We also have an exposure to oil prices in two forms. The first is in the prices of oil-based materials in our products, which are primarily the plastics and other components that we include in our finished products. The second is in the cost of delivery and freight, which would be passed on by the carriers that we use in the form of higher rates. Rising oil prices may have an adverse effect on cost of sales and operating expenses, and Russia's invasion of Ukraine may continue to create uncertainty in oil prices. Conflict in the Middle East may produce continued or increased disruptions to international shipping and fluctuating freight costs.
Disruptions Caused by Labor Disputes or Organized Labor Activities Could Materially Harm our Business and Reputation
Currently, approximately 500 of our Brazil and Mexico employees are represented by labor unions. Additionally, approximately 600 of our Vietnam employees are covered by a collective bargaining agreement. Disputes with the current labor unions or new union organizing activities could lead to production slowdowns or stoppages and make it difficult for us to meet scheduled delivery times for product shipments to some of our customers, which could result in a loss of business and material damage to our reputation. In addition, union activity and compliance with international labor standards could result in higher labor costs, which could have a material adverse effect on our financial position and results of operations.
Leased Property
We lease all of the properties used in our business. We can give no assurance that we will enter into new or renewal leases, or that, if entered into, the new lease terms will be similar to the existing terms or that the terms of any such new or renewal leases will not have a significant and material adverse effect on our operating results, financial condition and cash flows.
Competition
Competition within the industries we serve is based primarily on product availability, price, speed of delivery, ability to tailor specific solutions to customer needs, quality, and depth of product lines. Our competition is fragmented across our products, and, accordingly, we do not compete with any one company across all product lines. We compete with a variety of entities, some of which have greater financial resources. Other competitors are smaller and may be able to offer more specialized products. Our ability to remain competitive in this industry depends in part on our ability to successfully identify new product opportunities, develop and introduce new products and enhancements on a timely and cost-effective basis, as well as our ability to successfully identify and enter into strategic alliances with entities doing business within the industries we serve. Competition in any of these areas may reduce our sales and adversely affect our earnings or cash flow resulting from decreased sales volumes, reduced prices and increased costs of manufacturing, distributing and selling our products. There can be no assurance that our product offerings will be, and/or will remain, competitive or that strategic alliances, if any, will achieve the type, extent, and amount of success or business that we expect them to achieve. The sales of our products and technology may not occur or grow in the manner we expect, and thus we may not recoup costs incurred in R&D as quickly as we expect, if at all. Some customers may elect to engage a second source to manufacture the same product, and there is no guarantee that these customers will maintain the volume that was initially allocated to us throughout the product life cycle.
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Smart control solutions in the HVAC market tend to have long development lead-times, ranging from 12-24 months depending on product complexity. These development cycles include initial longer customer engagement upfront to define new product requirements as well as extensive testing and validation of thermostat control and performance against legacy and new HVAC equipment at the end. These long development lead-times translate into longer product life cycles, ranging from 5-8 years, as the product replacement cycle takes longer to define, develop and launch. Major HVAC OEMs typically select more than one supplier across their climate controller product categories: remote controls, wall-mount controllers and smart or connected thermostats. Suppliers are typically selected based on the breadth of their technology, development experience in the product category and their supply chain capabilities.
The home security and automation industry is highly fragmented and subject to significant competition and pricing pressures. In particular, the monitored security industry providers have highly recognized brands which may drive increased awareness of their security/automation offerings rather than ours, have access to greater capital and resources than us, and may spend significantly more on advertising, marketing and promotional activities which could have a material adverse effect on our ability to drive awareness and demand for our products and services. In addition, video service providers have expanded into the monitored security industry and are bundling their existing offerings with monitored security services. We also face competition from DIY companies that are increasingly providing products which enable customers to self-monitor and control their environments without third-party involvement. Further, DIY providers may also offer professional monitoring with the purchase of their systems and equipment or new IoT devices and services with automated features and capabilities that may be appealing to customers. Continued pricing pressure, improvements in technology and shifts in customer preferences towards self-monitoring or DIY could adversely impact our customer base and/or pricing structure and have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows.
Change in Competition and Pricing
Even with having our own factories, we will continue to rely on third-party manufacturers to build a portion of our products. Price is always an issue in winning and retaining business. As customers become increasingly price sensitive, we have experienced new competition arising from manufacturers who decided to go into direct competition with us by performing their own manufacturing. If this development continues, we may experience downward pressure on our pricing or lose sales, which may have a material adverse effect on our operating results, financial condition and cash flows.
Strategic Business Transactions
We have historically made strategic acquisitions of businesses in industries adjacent to our core business and will likely acquire additional businesses or engage in strategic partnerships in the future as part of our long-term growth strategy. The success of future acquisitions depends in large part on our ability to integrate the operations and personnel of the acquired companies and manage challenges that may arise as a result of the acquisitions, particularly when the acquired businesses operate in new or foreign markets. In the event we do not successfully integrate such future acquisitions into our existing operations so as to realize the expected return on our investment, our results of operations, cash flow or financial condition could be adversely affected. Furthermore, we may sell or divest certain non-core businesses or assets as a part of our business strategy. However, there can be no assurance that we will be successful in selling or divesting from any such businesses or assets. We may incur substantial expenses associated with identifying and evaluating potential sales. The process of exploring any sale or divestment may be time consuming and disruptive to our business operations, and if we are unable to effectively manage the process, our business, financial condition and operating results could be adversely affected. We also cannot assure that any potential sale or divestment, if consummated, will prove to be beneficial to our shareholders. Any potential sale or divestment would be dependent upon a number of factors that may be beyond our control, including, among other factors, market conditions, industry trends, the interest of third parties in the assets and the availability of financing to potential buyers on reasonable terms.
Recruitment and Retention of Talent and Key Employees
In order to be successful, we must attract, hire, retain, train, motivate, and develop qualified executives, engineers, technical staff and other key employees. Identifying, developing internally or hiring externally, training and retaining qualified executives, engineers and qualified sales representatives are critical to our future, and competition for experienced employees in the technology industry can be intense as employees' expectations of compensation, benefits and work flexibility continue to increase. Equity-based compensation can be important to attracting and retaining qualified employees and lack of positive performance in our stock price may adversely affect our ability to attract or retain key employees. In addition, workforce dynamics are constantly evolving in all regions, and we may not be able to manage changing workforce dynamics successfully.
Risks Related to Doing Business in the PRC
Presently, we manufacture many of our products in our factory in the PRC. Additionally, many of our contract manufacturers are located in the PRC. In addition to the other risks identified herein, doing business in the PRC carries a number of risks including the following:
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The Fluctuation of the Chinese Yuan Renminbi May Adversely Impact Our Manufacturing Costs
Under Chinese monetary policy, the Chinese Yuan Renminbi is permitted to fluctuate within a managed band against a basket of certain foreign currencies and has resulted in increased volatility in the exchange rate of the Chinese Yuan Renminbi against the U.S. Dollar. Any significant appreciation of the Chinese Yuan Renminbi against the U.S. Dollar could lead to higher manufacturing costs for our products.
Availability of Adequate Workforce Levels
Presently, a portion of workers at our PRC factory are obtained from third-party employment agencies. As the labor laws, social insurance and wage levels continue to grow and the workers become more sophisticated, our costs to employ these and other workers in the PRC may grow beyond that anticipated by management. Some of our key customers have demanded that we reduce the percentage of workers sourced from third-party employment agencies, which may also lead to increased costs in recruitment, retention and compliance. While we have already experienced increases in labor rates in the PRC, as the PRC market continues to open up and grow, we may experience an increase in competition for the same workers, resulting in either an inability to attract and retain an adequate number of qualified workers or an increase in our employment costs to obtain and retain these workers.
Changes in the Policies of the PRC Government May Have a Significant Impact Upon the Business We Conduct in the PRC and the Profitability of Such Business
Our business operations may be adversely affected by the current and future political environment in the PRC. The government of the PRC has exercised and continues to exercise substantial control over virtually every sector of the Chinese economy, through regulation and state ownership. Our ability to operate in the PRC may be adversely affected by changes in Chinese laws and regulations, including those relating to taxation, labor and social insurance, import and export tariffs, raw materials, environmental regulations, land use rights, property and other matters. Additionally, in light of recent geo-political tensions and competing territorial claims, the PRC's relationships with other countries or governments could grow more complex or openly adversarial, potentially leading to far-reaching market disruptions. Potential conflict across the Taiwan Strait or between the PRC and other countries or governments could cause a significant adverse effect to our business, and could lead to a disruption in our ability to operate in or source from the PRC.
The PRC Laws and Regulations Governing Our Current Business Operations are Sometimes Vague and Uncertain
There are substantial uncertainties regarding the interpretation and application of PRC laws and regulations, including but not limited to the laws and regulations governing our business, or the enforcement and performance of our arrangements with customers. We cannot predict what effect the interpretation of existing or new PRC laws or regulations may have on our business. If the relevant authorities find that we are in violation of PRC laws or regulations, they would have broad discretion in dealing with such a violation, including, without limitation: levying fines; revoking our business and other licenses; requiring that we restructure our ownership or operations; and requiring that we discontinue any portion or all of our business.
The PRC's Legal and Judicial System May Not Adequately Protect Our Business and Operations and the Rights of Foreign Investors
The PRC legal and judicial system may negatively impact foreign investors, with inconsistent enforcement of existing laws. In addition, the promulgation of new laws, changes to existing laws and the preemption of local regulations by national laws may adversely affect foreign investors.
Risks Relating to Regulation and Legal Matters
Certain Regulatory and Financial Risks Related to Climate Change
Growing concerns about climate change may result in the imposition of additional regulations or restrictions to which we may become subject. A number of governments or governmental bodies have introduced or are contemplating regulatory changes in response to climate change, including regulating greenhouse gas emissions. The outcome of new legislation or regulation in the U.S. and other jurisdictions in which we operate may result in new or additional requirements, additional charges to fund energy efficiency activities, and fees or restrictions on certain activities. Compliance with these climate change initiatives may also result in additional costs to us. Any adopted future climate change regulations could also negatively impact our ability to compete with companies situated in areas not subject to such limitations. Even without such regulation, increased public awareness and adverse publicity about potential impacts on climate change emanating from us or our industry could harm us. We may not be able to recover the cost of compliance with new or more stringent laws and regulations, which could adversely affect our results of operations, financial position or cash flows. Ultimately, the impacts of climate change, whether involving physical risks or transition risks are expected to be widespread and unpredictable and may materially adversely affect our business and financial results.
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Significant Developments From Potential Changes in U.S. Trade Policies Could Have a Material Adverse Effect On Us
The U.S. government implemented additional tariffs on certain goods imported from the PRC and Mexico. As of the date of this filing, the additional tariffs on Mexico have been paused. There can be no assurance that these tariffs will not be implemented or increased in the future, with the previously mentioned countries or additional countries with which we do business. We manufacture a substantial amount of our products in the PRC and Mexico and are presently subject to these additional tariffs and will remain so until the tariff lists are altered. These tariffs, and other governmental action relating to international trade agreements or policies, may adversely impact demand for our products, our costs, customers, suppliers and/or the U.S. economy or certain sectors thereof and, as a result, adversely impact our business. These additional tariffs may cause us to increase prices to our customers which may reduce demand, or, if we are unable to increase prices, result in lowering our margin on products sold. It remains unclear what the U.S. or foreign governments will or will not do with respect to tariffs, international trade agreements and policies on a short-term or long-term basis. We cannot predict future trade policy or the terms of any renegotiated trade agreements and their impacts on our business. The adoption and expansion of trade restrictions, the occurrence of a trade war, or other governmental action related to tariffs or trade agreements or policies has the potential to adversely impact demand for our products, our costs, our customers, our suppliers, and the U.S. economy, which in turn could adversely impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.
Policy Changes Affecting International Trade Could Adversely Impact the Demand for Our Products and Our Competitive Position
Due to the international scope of our operations, changes in government policies on foreign trade and investment may affect the demand for our products and services, impact the competitive position of our products or prevent us from being able to sell products in certain countries. Our business may benefit from free trade agreements. Efforts to withdraw from or substantially modify such agreements or the implementation of more restrictive trade policies such as more detailed inspections, higher tariffs, import or export licensing requirements, exchange controls or new barriers to entry, could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations, financial condition or cash flow and that of our customers, vendors and suppliers.
Risks and Uncertainties Associated with Our Expansion Into and Our Operations Outside of the United States May Adversely Affect Our Results of Operations, Cash Flow, Liquidity or Financial Condition
Our international operations continue to grow, making up a significant part of our current business and future strategic plans. We presently operate factories in the PRC, Vietnam, Mexico and Brazil, engineering centers in India, Japan and Korea and rely on third-party manufacturers located in Asia. We are increasingly exposed to the challenges and risks of doing business outside the United States, which could reduce our revenues or profits, increase our costs, result in significant liabilities or sanctions, or otherwise disrupt our business. These challenges include: (1) compliance with complex and changing laws, regulations and policies of governments that may impact our operations, such as foreign ownership restrictions, import and export controls, tariffs, and trade restrictions; (2) compliance with U.S. and foreign laws that affect the activities of companies abroad, such as anti-corruption laws, competition laws, currency regulations, and laws affecting dealings with certain nations; (3) limitations on our ability to repatriate non-U.S. earnings in a tax effective manner; (4) the difficulties involved in managing an organization doing business in many different countries; (5) uncertainties as to the enforceability of contract and intellectual property rights under local laws; (6) rapid changes in government policy, political or civil unrest, acts of terrorism, or the threat of international boycotts or U.S. anti-boycott legislation; and (7) currency exchange rate fluctuations.
We are also exposed to risks relating to U.S. policy with respect to companies doing business in foreign jurisdictions, and as such we are subject to a variety of taxes in the U.S. (federal, state, and local) and numerous foreign jurisdictions. We may recognize additional tax expense and be subject to additional tax liabilities due to changes in laws, regulations, administrative practices, principles, and interpretations related to tax, including changes to the global tax framework, competition, and other laws and accounting rules in various jurisdictions. Such changes could come about as a result of economic, political, and other conditions. Our tax expense and liabilities are also affected by other factors, such as changes in our business operations, acquisitions, investments, entry into new businesses and geographies, intercompany transactions, the relative amount of our foreign earnings, losses incurred in jurisdictions for which we are not able to realize related tax benefits, the applicability of special tax regimes, changes in foreign currency exchange rates, changes in our stock price, and changes in our deferred tax assets and liabilities and their valuation. Significant judgment is required in evaluating and estimating our tax expense and liabilities. In the ordinary course of our business, there are many transactions and calculations which make the ultimate tax determination uncertain.
We become subject to tax controversies in various jurisdictions at various times, and these jurisdictions may assess additional tax liabilities against us. Developments in an audit, investigation, or other tax controversy could have a material effect on our operating results or cash flows in the period or periods for which that development occurs, as well as for prior and subsequent periods. We regularly assess the likelihood of an adverse outcome resulting from these proceedings to determine the adequacy of our tax accruals. Although we believe our tax estimates are reasonable, the final outcome of audits, investigations, and any other tax controversies could be materially different from our historical tax accruals.
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Failure by Our International Operations to Comply With Anti-Corruption Laws or Trade Sanctions Could Increase Our Costs, Reduce Our Profits, Limit Our Growth, Harm Our Reputation, or Subject Us to Broader Liability
We are subject to restrictions imposed by the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and anti-corruption laws and regulations of other countries applicable to our operations, such as the U.K. Bribery Act. These laws require us to maintain adequate internal controls and accurate books and records. We have properties and do business in many parts of the world where corruption is common, and our compliance with anti-corruption laws may potentially conflict with local customs and practices. The compliance programs, internal controls and policies we maintain and enforce to promote compliance with these laws may not prevent our employees, contractors or agents from acting in ways prohibited by these laws and regulations. We are also subject to trade sanctions administered by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control and the U.S. Department of Commerce, and other U.S. government agencies, and authorities in other countries where we do business. Our Global Compliance Department, compliance programs, and internal control policies and procedures may not prevent conduct that is prohibited under these rules. The United States or other countries may impose additional sanctions at any time against any country in which or with whom we do business. Depending on the nature of the sanctions imposed, our operations in the relevant country could be restricted or otherwise adversely affected. Any violations of anti-corruption laws and regulations or trade sanctions could result in significant civil and criminal penalties, reduce our profits, disrupt or have a material adverse effect on our business or damage our reputation or result in lawsuits or regulatory actions being brought against us or our officers or directors. In addition, the operation of these laws and regulations or an imposition of further restrictions in these areas could increase our cost of operations, reduce our profits or cause us to forgo development opportunities or limit certain business operations that would otherwise support growth.
We are Subject to a Wide Variety of Complex Domestic and Foreign Laws and Regulations
We are subject to a wide variety of complex domestic and foreign laws and regulations, and legal compliance risks, including securities laws, tax laws, employment and pension-related laws, competition laws, U.S. and foreign export and trading laws, laws governing improper business practices, and health, safety and environmental laws and regulations. These laws and regulations not only govern our current operations and products, but could also impose liability on us for our past operations. From time to time, our Company, our operations and the industries in which we operate are being reviewed or investigated by regulators, which may lead to enforcement actions or the assertion of private litigation claims and damages. Our costs to respond to any investigation or to comply with these laws and regulations may increase as these requirements become more stringent in the future, and these increased costs may adversely affect our results of operations, cash flow or financial condition. Although we believe that we have adopted appropriate risk management and compliance programs to mitigate these risks, the global and diverse nature of our operations means that compliance risks will continue to exist. Investigations, examinations and other proceedings, the nature and outcome of which cannot be predicted, will likely arise from time to time. These investigations, examinations and other proceedings may subject us to significant liability and require us to pay significant settlements, fines and penalties, which may have a material adverse effect on our results of operations, cash flows or financial condition.
Patents, Trademarks, and Copyrights
We have numerous patents, trade secrets, trademarks, trade names, and know-how that are valuable to our business. However, the procedures by which we identify, document, and file for patent, trademark, and copyright protection are based solely on engineering and management judgment, with no assurance that a specific filing will be issued, or if issued, will deliver any lasting value to us. Because of the rapid innovation of products and technologies that is characteristic of our industry, there can be no assurance that rights granted under any patent will provide competitive advantages to us or will be adequate to safeguard and maintain our proprietary rights. We further believe that while our business is not materially dependent upon any single patent, trade secret, trademark, trade name, copyright, or know-how, we do have "families" of patents that are interrelated, which if determined to be invalid or unenforceable, could have a detrimental effect on our business. Despite our efforts to protect such intellectual property and other proprietary information from unauthorized use or disclosure, third parties may attempt to disclose, obtain or use our intellectual property and information without our authorization. Although we rely on the patent, trademark, trade secret and copyright laws of the United States and other countries to protect our intellectual property rights, the laws of some countries may not protect such rights to the same extent as the laws of the United States. Unauthorized use of our intellectual property by third parties, the failure of foreign countries to have laws to protect our intellectual property rights, or an inability to effectively enforce such rights in foreign countries could have an adverse effect on our business.
In addition, as is typical in our business, third parties (including non-practicing entities ("NPEs")) may challenge the validity of our patents. In the event that such challenges prove successful, the value of our patents may decline which, in turn, could have an adverse effect on our business. Further, some of our products include or use technology and/or components of third parties. While it may be necessary in the future to seek or renew licenses relating to various aspects of such products, we believe that, based upon past experience and industry practice, such licenses may be obtained on commercially reasonable terms; however, there can be no guarantee that such licenses may be obtained on such terms or at all. Because of technological changes in the
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wireless and home control industry, current extensive patent coverage, and the rapid rate of issuance of new patents, it is possible certain components of our products and business methods may unknowingly infringe upon the patents of others.
Potential for Litigation
As is typical in our industry and for the nature and kind of business in which we are engaged, from time to time various claims, charges and litigation are asserted or commenced by third parties against us or by us against third parties, arising from or related to product liability, infringement of patent or other intellectual property rights, breach of warranty, contractual relations or employee relations. The amounts claimed may be substantial, but they may not bear any reasonable relationship to the merits of the claims or the extent of any real risk of court awards assessed against us or in our favor. If a customer or third party believes that he or she has suffered harm to person or property due to an actual or alleged security system failure, he or she (or their insurers) may pursue legal action against us, and the cost of defending the legal action and of any judgment against us could be substantial. In particular, because some of our products and services are intended to help protect lives and real and personal property, we may have greater exposure to litigation risks than businesses that provide other consumer and small business products and services. While our customer contracts contain a series of risk-mitigation provisions that are aimed at limiting our liability and/or limiting a claimant's ability to pursue legal action against us, in the event of litigation with respect to such matters it is possible that these risk-mitigation provisions may be deemed not applicable or unenforceable and, regardless of the ultimate outcome, we may incur significant costs of defense that could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows.
Environmental Matters
Many of our products are subject to various federal, state, local and international laws governing chemical substances in products, including laws regulating the manufacture and distribution of chemical substances and restricting the presence of certain substances in electronics products. In addition, many of these laws and regulations make producers of electrical goods responsible for collection, recycling, treatment and disposal of recovered products. As a result, we may face significant costs and liabilities in complying with these laws and any future laws and regulations or enforcement policies that may have a material adverse effect upon our operating results, financial condition, and cash flows. In addition, our operations, supply chain and our products are expected to become increasingly subject to federal, state, local and foreign laws, regulations, and international treaties relating to climate change, such as climate disclosure, carbon pricing or product energy efficiency requirements, requiring us to comply or potentially face market-access limitations or other sanctions including fines. We strive to continually improve the energy and carbon efficiency of our operations, supply chain and product portfolio and deliver more cost-effective and lower carbon technology solutions to our customers.
Regulations Related to the Use of Conflict-Free Minerals May Increase Our Costs and Expenses, and an Inability to Certify that Our Products are Conflict-Free May Adversely Affect Customer Relationships
The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act contains provisions to improve the transparency and accountability of the use by public companies in their products of minerals mined in certain countries and to prevent the sourcing of such "conflict" minerals. As a result, the SEC enacted annual disclosure and reporting requirements for public companies to conduct due diligence to determine the source of any conflict minerals used in our products and to make annual disclosures in filings with the SEC. Because our supply chain is broad-based and complex, we may not be able to easily verify the origins for all minerals used in our products. In addition, the rules may reduce the number of suppliers who provide components and products containing conflict-free minerals and thus may increase the cost of the components used in manufacturing our products and the costs of our products to us. Any increased costs and expenses may have a material adverse impact on our financial condition and results of operations. Further, if we are unable to certify that our products are conflict free, we may face challenges with our customers, which may place us at a competitive disadvantage, and our reputation may be harmed.
The Prominence and Evolution on Disclosures related to Environmental, Social and Governance ("ESG") Matters May Expose Us to Certain Performance and Reputational Risks
We have established certain goals related to ESG matters and the reporting of ESG data. Our failure to adequately update, accomplish or accurately track and report on these goals on a timely basis, or at all, could adversely affect our reputation, financial performance and growth and expose us to increased scrutiny from the investment community, special interest groups and enforcement authorities. Standards for tracking and reporting ESG matters continue to evolve. Methodologies for reporting ESG data may be updated and previously reported ESG data may be adjusted to reflect improvement in availability and quality of third-party data, changing assumptions, changes in the nature and scope of our operations and other changes in circumstances. Our processes and controls for reporting ESG matters relating to our operations and supply chain are evolving along with various standards for identifying, measuring, and reporting ESG metrics, including ESG related disclosures that may be required by the SEC, European and other regulators, and such standards may change over time. One such method is our use of the EcoVadis sustainability rating system. Further, we may amend, abandon or replace our goals related to ESG matters due to a change in strategy, reduced relevance of such goals or changing market conditions and we may take certain actions that
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stakeholders or regulators view as contrary to such goals. Certain stakeholders may have different views on where our focus on ESG matters should be placed, including different views of regulators in the various jurisdictions in which we operate. If our ESG practices do not meet evolving investor or other stakeholder expectations and standards, then our reputation or our attractiveness as an investment, business partner, service provider or employer could be negatively impacted.
Risks Relating to Finance
Growth Projections
Management has made projections required for the preparation of financial statements in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States ("U.S. GAAP") regarding future events and the financial performance of the Company, including those involving:
•the benefits the Company expects as a result of the development and success of products and technologies, including new products and technologies;
•the benefits expected by conducting business in Asian and Latin American markets, without which, we may not be able to recover the costs we incur to enter into such markets;
•new contracts with new and existing customers and new market penetrations;
•the expected continued adoption of the Company's technologies in home entertainment, specifically universal AV control of connected entertainment devices;
•the expected continued growth in digital TVs, DVRs, PVRs and overall growth in the Company's industry;
•the impact competitors and OTT providers may have on our business; and
•the effects we may experience due to current global and regional economic conditions.
Actual events or results may be unfavorable to management's projections, which may have a material adverse effect on our projected operating results, financial condition and cash flows.
Additionally, we have long-lived and intangible assets recorded on our consolidated balance sheet. We assess these assets for impairment whenever events or changes in circumstances indicate that the fair value may be below its carrying value. Factors considered important that may trigger said assessment include, among others, a significant adverse change in legal factors or in business climate, a decline in macroeconomic conditions, a significant decline in our financial performance or a significant decline in the price of our common stock for a sustained period of time. Impairment assessment involves judgment as to assumptions regarding future sales and cash flows and the impact of market conditions on those assumptions. Future events and changing market conditions may impact our assumptions and may result in changes in our estimates of future sales and cash flows that may result in us incurring substantial impairment charges, which would adversely affect our results of operations or financial condition.
Market Projections and Data are Forward-looking in Nature
Our strategy is based on our own projections and on analyst, industry observer and expert projections, which are forward-looking in nature and are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties. The validity of their and our assumptions, the timing and scope of the markets within which we compete, economic conditions, customer buying patterns, the timeliness of equipment development, pricing of products, and availability of capital for infrastructure improvements may affect these predictions. In addition, market data upon which we rely is based on third-party reports that may be inaccurate. The inaccuracy of any of these projections and/or market data may adversely affect our operating results and financial condition.
Potential Fluctuations in Quarterly Results
We may from time to time increase our operating expenses to fund greater levels of R&D, sales and marketing activities, development of new distribution channels, improvements in our operational and financial systems, moving manufacturing capabilities to other countries, and development of our customer support capabilities, In addition, legal expenses could increase from time to time as we enhance or increase our litigation efforts and/or to support our efforts to comply with or respond to various government regulations and investigations. To the extent such expenses precede or are not subsequently followed by increased revenues, our business, operating results, financial condition and cash flows will be adversely affected. In addition, we may experience significant fluctuations in future quarterly operating results that may be caused by many other factors, including demand for our products, introduction or enhancement of products by us and our competitors, the loss or acquisition of any significant customers, market acceptance of new products, price reductions by us or our competitors, mix of distribution channels through which our products are sold, product or supply constraints, level of product returns, mix of customers and products sold, component pricing, mix of international and domestic revenues, foreign currency exchange rate fluctuations and general economic conditions. In addition, as a strategic response to changes in the competitive environment, we may from time to time make certain pricing or marketing decisions or acquisitions that may have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations or financial condition. As a result, we believe period-to-period comparisons of our results of operations are
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not necessarily meaningful and should not be relied upon as an indication of future performance. Due to all of the foregoing factors, it is possible that in some future quarters our operating results will be below the expectations of public market analysts and investors. If this happens the price of our common stock may be materially adversely affected.
Fluctuations in Foreign Currency Exchange Rates or Interest Rates May Adversely Affect Our Results of Operations, Cash Flow, Liquidity or Financial Condition
Because of our international operations, we are exposed to risk associated with interest rates and value changes in foreign currencies, which may adversely affect our business. We earn revenues and incur expenses in foreign currencies as part of our operations outside of the U.S. Accordingly, fluctuations in currency exchange rates may significantly increase the amount of U.S. dollars required for foreign currency expenses or significantly decrease the U.S. dollars we receive from foreign currency revenues. We are also exposed to currency translation risk because the results of our non-U.S. business are generally reported in local currency, which we then translate to U.S. dollars for inclusion in our financial statements. As a result, changes between the foreign exchange rates and the U.S. dollar affect the amounts we record for our foreign assets, liabilities, revenues and expenses, and could have a negative effect on our financial results. We expect that our exposure to foreign currency exchange rate fluctuations will grow as the relative contribution of our non-U.S. operations increases. We actively manage the exposure of our foreign currency risk as part of our overall financial risk management policy, by entering into foreign exchange hedging agreements with financial institutions to reduce exposures to some of the principal currencies, but these efforts may not be successful. These hedging agreements also do not cover all currencies in which we do business, do not eliminate foreign currency risk entirely for the currencies that they do cover, and involve costs and risks of their own in the form of transaction costs, credit requirements and counterparty risk.
In addition, under the Second Amended and Restated Credit Agreement ("Second Amended Credit Agreement") with U.S. Bank National Association ("U.S. Bank"), we may elect to pay interest on the revolving line of credit ("U.S. Credit Line") based on the Secured Overnight Financing Rate ("SOFR") plus an applicable margin or a base rate (based on the prime rate of U.S. Bank or as otherwise specified in the Second Amended Credit Agreement), plus an applicable margin. Further, under our Line of Credit Agreement (the "Line of Credit Agreement") with the Bank of China, we pay interest on the provided line of credit ("China Credit Line") based on the one-year rate from the National Interbank Funding Center less a margin. To the extent these interest rates increase, our interest expense will increase, which could adversely affect our financial condition, operating results and cash flows.
Our Ability to Generate Cash Depends on Many Factors Beyond Our Control
Our historical financial results have been, and we anticipate that our future financial results will be, subject to fluctuations. Our ability to generate cash is subject to general economic, financial, competitive, legislative, regulatory and other factors that are beyond our control. We cannot assure you that our business will generate sufficient cash flow from our operations or that future borrowings will be available to us in an amount sufficient to enable us to make payments of our debt, fund our other liquidity needs and make planned capital expenditures.
The degree to which we are currently leveraged could have important consequences for stockholders. For example, it could:
•require us to dedicate a substantial portion of our cash flow from operations to the payment of debt service, reducing the availability of our cash flow to fund working capital, capital expenditures, acquisitions and other general corporate purposes;
•increase our vulnerability to adverse economic or industry conditions;
•limit our ability to obtain additional financing in the future to enable us to react to changes in our business; or
•place us at a competitive disadvantage compared to businesses in our industry that have less debt.
A significant portion of our operations is conducted through our subsidiaries. As a result, our ability to generate sufficient cash flow for our needs is dependent on the earnings of our subsidiaries and the payment of those earnings to us in the form of dividends, loans or advances and through repayment of loans or advances from us. Except for Universal Electronics BV, which has guaranteed the performance under our Credit Line, our subsidiaries are separate and distinct legal entities and have no obligation to pay any amounts due on our debt or to provide us with funds to meet our cash flow needs. In addition, any payment of dividends, loans or advances by our subsidiaries may be subject to statutory or contractual restrictions. Payments to us by our subsidiaries will also be contingent upon our subsidiaries' earnings and business considerations. Our right to receive any assets of any of our subsidiaries upon their liquidation or reorganization will be effectively subordinated to the claims of that subsidiary's creditors, including trade creditors. In addition, even if we are a creditor of any of our subsidiaries, our rights as a creditor would be subordinate to any security interest in the assets of our subsidiaries and any indebtedness of our subsidiaries senior to that held by us. Further, changes in the laws of foreign jurisdictions in which we operate may adversely affect the ability of some of our foreign subsidiaries to repatriate funds to us.
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We may also fund a portion of our seasonal working capital needs and obtain funding for other general corporate purposes through short-term borrowings backed by our revolving credit facilities. If any of the banks in these credit and financing facilities are unable to perform on their commitments, our cash flow, liquidity or financial condition may be adversely impacted. Although we currently have available credit facilities to fund our current operating needs, we cannot be certain that we will be able to replace our existing credit facilities or refinance our existing or future debt when necessary. Our cost of borrowing and ability to access the capital markets are affected not only by market conditions, but also by our debt and credit ratings assigned by the major credit rating agencies. Downgrades in these ratings will increase our cost of borrowing and may have an adverse effect on our access to the capital markets, including our access to the commercial paper market. An inability to access the capital markets may have a material adverse effect on our results of operations, cash flow, liquidity or financial condition. Additionally, any failure to comply with covenants in the instruments governing our debt could result in an event of default which, if not cured or waived, would have a material adverse effect on us.
Risks Relating to Our Stock
The Price of Our Common Stock is Volatile and May Decline Regardless of Our Operating Performance
Historically, we have had large fluctuations in the price of our common stock including a significant decline in our stock price, and such fluctuations may continue. The trading market for our common stock has historically been at low volumes and our market price is volatile and may fluctuate significantly in response to a number of factors, most of which we cannot control, including the public's response to press releases or other public announcements by us or third parties, including our filings with the SEC and announcements relating to product and technology development, relationships with new and existing customers, litigation and other legal proceedings in which we are involved and intellectual property impacting us or our business; announcements concerning strategic transactions, such as spin-offs, joint ventures and acquisitions or divestitures; the financial projections we may provide to the public, any changes in these projections or our failure to meet these projections; changes in financial estimates or ratings by any securities analysts who follow our common stock, our failure to meet these estimates or failure of those analysts to initiate or maintain coverage of our common stock; the inclusion or removal of our common stock from any indices; investor perceptions as to the likelihood of achievement of near-term goals; changes in market share of significant customers; changes in operating performance and stock market valuations of other technology or content providing companies generally; and market conditions or trends in our industry or the economy as a whole. Stockholders of other companies have instituted securities class action litigation against such companies after periods of price volatility in such companies' stock. If we were to become involved in such securities litigation, we may incur substantial costs and the attention of management may be diverted from our business.
In addition, our officers and directors periodically sell shares of our common stock which they own, many times pursuant to trading plans established under Rule 10b5-1 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the "Exchange Act"). Sales of shares by our officers and directors may not be indicative of their respective opinions of our performance at the time of sale or of our potential future performance. Nonetheless, the market price of our stock may be affected by such sales of shares by our officers and directors.
Approved Stock Repurchase Programs May Not Result in a Positive Return of Capital to Stockholders
Periodically, our Board approves programs to repurchase our common stock based upon an assessment of the then current value as compared to the then trading ranges and investor analyst reports. Also considered in this decision is the effect any such repurchases may have on our cash balances and needs, cash flow, and short- and long-term borrowing. Additionally, we, the technology industry and the stock market as a whole have experienced extreme stock price and volume fluctuations that have affected stock prices in ways that may have been unrelated to our and these companies' operating performance. Price volatility over a given period may cause the average price at which we repurchase our own stock to exceed the stock's price at a given point in time. While we believe our stock price should reflect expectations of future growth and profitability, we also believe our stock price should reflect expectations that our share repurchase program will be fully consummated even though our share repurchase program does not obligate us to acquire any specific number of shares. If we fail to meet expectations related to future growth, profitability, share repurchases or other market expectations, our stock price may decline significantly, which could have a material adverse impact on investor confidence.
Our Governing Corporate Documents Contain, and Our Board of Directors May Implement, Antitakeover Provisions that May Deter Takeover Attempts
Our governing corporate documents, among other things, require super-majority votes in connection with certain mergers and similar transactions. In addition, our Board of Directors may, without stockholder approval, implement other anti-takeover defenses, such as a stockholder's rights plan.
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General Risks
Economic Downturns and Other Global, National, and Regional Conditions May Adversely Affect Our Results of Operations, Cash Flow, Liquidity or Financial Condition
Because we conduct our business on a global platform, our business is sensitive to global and regional business and economic conditions. Adverse changes in global, national, regional economies, governmental policies (including in areas such as trade, travel, immigration, healthcare, and related issues), and geopolitical conditions (such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine, conflict in the Middle East, tension across the Taiwan Strait and tension between the United States and the PRC, Mexico and Canada, and the ramifications of those and other events) impact our activities. Additionally, we conduct business in countries, including Argentina, that have policies which restrict outbound U.S. Dollar transactions. Such conditions in the United States and worldwide may impact our business due to weak economic conditions, changes in energy prices and currency values, political instability, heightened travel security measures, advisories, or disruptions, and concerns over disease, violence, war, or terrorism may reduce the demand for some of our products and impair the ability of those with whom we do business to satisfy their obligations to us, each of which could adversely affect our results of operations, cash flow, liquidity or financial condition. Higher inflation rates, interest rates, tax rates and unemployment rates, higher labor and healthcare costs, recessions, changing governmental policies, laws and regulations, and other economic factors could also adversely affect demand for some of our products and our results of operations, cash flow, liquidity or financial condition and that of our customers, vendors and suppliers.
Global economic uncertainty continues to exist. The continuation or worsening of the global economic downturn may adversely impact our net sales, the collection of accounts receivable, funding for working capital needs, expected cash flow generation from current and acquired businesses, and our investments, which may adversely impact our results of operations, cash flow, liquidity or financial condition. We finance a portion of our sales through trade credit. Credit markets remain tight, and some customers who require financing for their businesses have not been able to obtain necessary financing. A continuation or worsening of these conditions could limit our ability to collect our accounts receivable, which could adversely affect our results of operations, cash flow, liquidity or financial condition.