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Year-over-year tone shift - average net-tone change across Risk Factors and MD&A vs the prior 10-K.
Why YoY instead of absolute: the LM lexicon has ~6.6× more negative words than positive (legal/risk-disclosure language is heavy on hedging), so every 10-K reads bearish on raw tone. Year-over-year change strips that bias and surfaces the actual shift in management's framing.
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Risk Factors (Item 1A)
46,292 words
Risk Factors Summary
Our business is subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, including those described more fully below in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. The following is a summary of principal risks and uncertainties that could materially affect our business, results of operations, financial condition, and prospects. This summary should be read in conjunction with the “Risk Factors” section and should not be relied upon as an exhaustive summary of the material risks and uncertainties facing our business.
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We have a history of losses, anticipate increases in our operating expenses in the near-term, and may not achieve or sustain profitability. If we cannot achieve and sustain profitability, our business, results of operations, and financial condition will be adversely affected.
We have experienced rapid growth in recent periods, and our recent growth rates may not be indicative of our future growth.
Our future revenues and operating results will be harmed if we are unable to acquire new customers, if our customers do not renew their arrangements with us, or if we are unable to expand sales to our existing customers.
If the market for security, networking, and analytics does not grow, our ability to grow our business and our results of operations may be adversely affected.
Our business and growth depend in part on the success of our relationships with our partner ecosystem. If we are unable to maintain or develop these relationships, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be materially and adversely affected.
Our operating results may fluctuate significantly, which could make our future results difficult to predict and could cause our operating results to fall below expectations.
If we do not effectively develop and expand our sales and marketing capabilities, we may be unable to add new customers or increase sales to our existing customers, and our business will be adversely affected.
Our sales cycle is long and unpredictable, and our sales efforts require considerable time and expense.
Our international operations expose us to significant risks, and failure to manage those risks could materially and adversely impact our business, results of operations and financial condition.
If we fail to obtain, maintain, protect, defend, or adequately enforce our intellectual property or proprietary rights, our competitive position could be impaired, and we may losevaluable assets, generate reduced revenue, and incur costlylitigation to protect our rights.
Our use of artificial intelligence ("AI") and machine learning ("ML"), and the integration of AI and ML within our platform and products, may not be successful and may present business, compliance, and reputational challenges, which could lead to operational or reputational damage, competitive harm, legal and regulatory risk, and additional costs, any of which could adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
If our internal networks, systems or data are or are perceived to have been breached, our platform and products may be perceived as insecure, our reputation may be damaged, and our financial results may be negatively impacted.
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The actual or perceived failure of our platform and products to block malware or prevent a security breach or incident could harm our reputation and adversely impact our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
If we are not able to satisfy data protection, security, privacy and other government- and industry-specific requirements or regulations, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be harmed.
Servicing our substantial indebtedness may require a significant amount of cash, and we may not have sufficient cash flow from our business or the ability to raise funds necessary to satisfy our obligations under our indebtedness. Our debt could also expose us to other risks that could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.
The multi-class structure of our common stock will have the effect of concentrating voting control with the holders of our outstanding Class B common stock. This ownership will limit or preclude your ability to influence corporate matters.
We cannot predict the effect our multi-class structure may have on the trading price of our Class A common stock.
Risks Related to Our Business and Industry
We have a history of losses, anticipate increases in our operating expenses in the near-term, and may not achieve or sustain profitability. If we cannot achieve and sustain profitability, our business, results of operations, and financial condition will be adversely affected.
We have experienced net losses in each period since inception. We generated net losses of $679.4 million, $354.5 million, and $344.9 million for fiscal 2026, fiscal 2025, and fiscal 2024, respectively. As of January 31, 2026, we had an accumulated deficit of $2.6 billion. While we have experienced rapid revenue growth in recent periods, we are not certain whether or when we will obtain a high enough volume of sales to achieve or maintain profitability in the future. We expect our operating expenses will increase over time as we continue to invest meaningfully in expanding our sales force, increasing our marketing efforts, expanding into new markets and further developing our technology architecture and platform, and as we incur additional expenses as a result of operating as a public company, including costs to comply with the rules and regulations applicable to companies listed on a national securities exchange, costs related to compliance and reporting obligations, and increased expenses for insurance, investor relations, and professional services. In addition, our ability to achieve and maintain profitability will be highly dependent on our ability to successfully market our platform and products to new and existing customers. These efforts may prove to be more expensive than we currently anticipate, and we may not succeed in increasing our revenue sufficiently, or at all, to offset these higher expenses. Our efforts and investments to implement systems and processes to scale operations may not be sufficient or may not be effective. As a result, we may incur significant losses in the future for a number of reasons, including the other risks described herein, unforeseen expenses, difficulties, complications, or delays, and other unknown events. If we are unable to achieve and sustain profitability, the value of our business and the trading price of our Class A common stock may significantly decrease.
In addition, in the several quarters following the completion of our initial public offering ("IPO"), we expect to recognize significant stock-based compensation expense related to certain outstanding restricted stock units ("RSUs"). While the performance-based condition was satisfied in connection with the IPO, these equity awards remain subject to ongoing service-based vesting conditions and, in certain cases, market-based vesting conditions, which has resulted and will contribute to increases in our operating expenses and will negatively impact our ability to achieveprofitability in future periods.
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We have experienced rapid growth in recent periods, and our recent growth rates may not be indicative of our future growth.
We were founded in 2012 and have been growing rapidly over the last several years, with revenue of $709.0 million, $538.3 million, and $406.9 million for fiscal 2026, fiscal 2025, and fiscal 2024, respectively, and we may continue to experience rapid growth in the future. As a result, our ability to forecast our future results of operations is subject to a number of uncertainties, including our ability to effectively plan for and model future growth. Many factors may contribute to declines in our revenue growth rate, including increased competition, slowing demand for our platform and products from existing and new customers, a failure by us to capitalize on growth opportunities, terminations of contracts by our existing customers, and the maturation of our business, among others. Our recent and historical growth should not be considered indicative of our future performance. Even if our revenue continues to increase over the long term, our revenue growth rate has in the past declined, and we expect our revenue growth rate to decline in the future, as a result of a variety of factors, including the maturation of our business. We have encountered in the past, and will encounter in the future, risks and uncertainties frequently experienced by growing companies in rapidly changing industries. If our assumptions regarding these risks and uncertainties, which we use to plan and operate our business, are incorrect or change, or if we do not address these risks successfully, our operating and financial results could differ materially from our expectations, our growth rates may slow and our business, results of operations, and financial condition could be harmed.
Overall growth of our revenue also depends on a number of factors, including our ability to acquire new customers, retain our existing customers and expand sales to existing customers; offer a compelling platform and products; execute an effective sales and marketing strategy; attract, effectively train, and retain new sales, marketing, professional services, and support personnel in the markets we pursue; develop or expand relationships with channel partners; expand into new geographies and vertical markets; develop and deploy new products, features, and functionalities; and provide quality customer support once deployed.
We may not successfullyaccomplish any of these objectives. If we do not, or if the assumptions that we use to plan our business are incorrect or change in reaction to changes in our market, or if we are unable to maintain our revenue growth for any reason, including the reasons listed above, it may be difficult to achieve and maintain profitability, the trading price of our Class A common stock may be volatile, demand for our platform and products could decline, and our business, financial condition, and results of operations may be adversely affected.
Our future revenues and operating results will be harmed if we are unable to acquire new customers, if our customers do not renew their arrangements with us, or if we are unable to expand sales to our existing customers.
To continue to grow our business, we must continue to add new customers. Our success in adding new customers depends on numerous factors, including our ability to offer a compelling platform and products; execute an effective sales and marketing strategy; attract, effectively train, and retain new sales, marketing, professional services, and support personnel in the markets we pursue; develop or expand relationships with channel partners, including system integrators, value added resellers ("VARs"), technology partners, and managed service providers (“MSPs”); expand into new geographies and vertical markets; deploy our platform and products for new customers; and provide quality customer support once deployed.
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In addition, we also believe that it is important to our continued growth that our existing customers renew their arrangements with us when their contract terms expire. A substantial majority of our customers purchase subscriptions with a contract term of one to three years. Our customers have no obligation to renew their contracts with us, and some of our customers have in the past chosen not to do so. Even if our customers do choose to renew their contracts, they may decide not to renew their contracts for a similar contract period, at the same prices and terms, or with the same or a greater number of users or capacity. Our customer retention and expansion are difficult to accurately predict and may decline or fluctuate as a result of a number of factors, including our customers' satisfaction with our platform and products and their spending levels, our pricing, industry developments, competition, changing regulatory environments, and general economic conditions. Our ability to increase revenue also depends on our ability to expand our customer relationships over time by increasing the number of products we offer and use cases we serve and the number, business functions and locations of users for whom our customers license our products. Our ability to increase sales to existing customers depends on several factors, including their experience with implementing and using our platform and products and the existing products they have implemented, their ability to integrate our platform and products with existing technologies, and our pricing model.
Furthermore, the market for security, networking, and analytics products such as ours is relatively new, and if we are unable to convince organizations of the benefits of our platform and products, then we may be unable to acquire new customers or keep existing customers. If we are unable to successfully acquire new customers, retain our existing customers, expand sales to existing customers, or introduce new products, our business, results of operations, and financial condition would be adversely affected. The adverse effect on our financial results may be particularly acute because of the significant research, development, marketing, sales, and other expenses we will have incurred in connection with the new products.
If the market for security, networking, and analytics does not grow, our ability to grow our business and our results of operations may be adversely affected.
The market for security, networking, and analytics, including our platform and products, is rapidly evolving. We believe our future success will depend in large part on growth in the market for security, networking, and analytics. We also believe that our platform and products represent a significant shift from on-premises appliance-based security solutions. While cloud-based security, networking, and analytics solutions have seen increased adoption, traditional on-premises security and networking appliance and software solutions continue to be rooted in the infrastructure of many of our potential customers, particularly large enterprises, because of their prior investment in, and their familiarity with, such solutions. As such, it is difficult to predict future demand for cloud-based security, networking, and analytics or the success of competitive products, and, as a result, customer adoption and retention rates for these products and the future growth of this market. Any expansion in this market depends on a number of factors, including the cost, performance, perceived value associated with our platform and products and similar solutions of our competitors, and enterprises' potential preference to manage security with existing appliances and infrastructure alone as opposed to investing in a security, networking, and analytics platform such as ours. The markets for some of our products are new, unproven, and evolving, and our future success depends on growth and expansion of these markets. For example, we have invested and intend to continue to invest in the development and marketing of products to address the potential needs of AI usage by our customers, however the adoption of AI by our customers and their needs for managing AI are not certain. Trends in hybrid and remote work may also impact our business. For example, some large enterprises have publicly signaled an intent to reduce hybrid and remote work, and a widespread reduction in hybrid and remote work could adversely impact demand for our platform and products. If our platform and products do not achieve widespread adoption or there is a reduction in demand for our platform and products due to a lack of customer acceptance, technological challenges, competing products or solutions, concerns relating to privacy, data protection, or cybersecurity, decreases in corporate spending, changes in hybrid and remote work arrangements, the impact of AI, weakening economic conditions or otherwise, it could result in early terminations, reduced customer retention rates, or decreased revenue, any of which would adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
Additionally, if the incidence of security breaches and incidents were to decline, or enterprises or governments were to perceive that the incidence of security breaches and incidents had declined, our ability to attract and retain customers could be adversely affected. We may face additional difficulties in attracting organizations that use legacy systems and products to purchase our platform and products if they believe that these legacy systems and products are more cost-effective, are bound by long term contracts, or provide a level of security that is sufficient to meet their needs. Furthermore, the use of cloud security, networking, and analytics is relatively new, and if we are unable to convince organizations of the benefits of our platform and products, then we may be unable to acquire new customers or keep existing customers. If organizations do not continue to adopt our platform for any of the reasons
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discussed above or for other reasons not contemplated, our sales will not grow as quickly as anticipated, or at all, and our business, operating results and financial condition will be adversely affected.
Our business and growth depend in part on the success of our relationships with our partner ecosystem. If we are unable to maintain or develop these relationships, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be materially and adversely affected.
We rely extensively on our ecosystem of channel partners, including VARs and distributors, technology alliances, service and telecommunications partners, MSPs, system integrators, and other strategic partners to deliver, customize, integrate, and manage our platform and products for substantially all of our customers. A significant portion of our sales also originates within our partner ecosystem. For example, sales through our top five partners and their affiliates, in aggregate, represented 35% of our revenue for fiscal 2026 and 33% of our revenue for fiscal 2025. We have experienced, and may in the future experience, consolidation in our partner ecosystem through the merger of certain of our channel partners, which may increase our reliance on individual channel partners. Not only does our joint sales approach require additional investment to grow and train our sales force, but we believe that continued growth in our business is dependent upon identifying, developing and maintaining strategic relationships with our existing and potential channel partners. Our arrangements with our channel partners are generally non-exclusive, meaning they may offer customers the products and services of several different companies, including products and services that compete with our platform and products. If our channel partners do not effectively market and sell our platform and products, choose to use greater efforts to market and sell our competitors' products or services, fail to meet the needs of our customers, or cease marketing our platform and products or providing services to us, our ability to grow our business and sell our platform and products may be adversely affected. Our channel partners may cease marketing our platform and products with limited or no notice and with little or no penalty. If one or more of our channel partners determines that it is unable to both provide services to us or cooperate with us in our go-to-market efforts while at the same time providing services to our competitors, those channel partners may cease marketing our platform and products or otherwise cease providing services to us or cooperating with us in our go-to-market efforts. Our ability to achieve revenue growth in the future will depend in part on our maintaining successful relationships with our channel partners, identifying additional channel partners and training our channel partners to independently sell and deploy our platform and products. If we are unable to maintain our relationships with our existing channel partners or develop successful relationships with new channel partners or if our channel partners fail to perform, the demand for our platform and our products could decline, and our business, results of operations and financial condition could be materially and adversely affected.
We also collaborate with adjacent technology vendors to offer comprehensive solutions to our respective customers, including through mutual referrals and integrations and through cloud marketplace programs. If we do not effectively collaborate with such technology partners, or if they elect to terminate their relationships with us or develop and market solutions that compete with our platform and products, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be materially and adversely affected.
Our operating results may fluctuate significantly, which could make our future results difficult to predict and could cause our operating results to fall below expectations.
Our quarterly revenue and operating results tend to fluctuate from period to period, and we believe that our quarterly results may vary significantly in the future. Consequently, you should not rely on the results of any one quarter as an indication of future performance. Period-to-period comparisons of our revenue and operating results may not be meaningful and, as a result, may not fully reflect the underlying performance of our business.
Our quarterly operating results may fluctuate as a result of a variety of factors, including, but not limited to, those listed below, many of which are outside of our control:
our ability to achieve broad market acceptance and the level of demand for our platform and our products;
our ability to attract new customers, particularly large enterprises;
our ability to retain customers and expand their usage of our platform and products, particularly our largest customers;
increases in and timing of operating expenses, particularly for sales and marketing, that we may incur to grow and expand our operations and to remain competitive;
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our ability to successfully expand in the United States and internationally and further penetrate key markets;
the effectiveness of our sales and marketing programs;
the length and unpredictable nature of our sales cycle;
the timing and availability of renewals;
technological changes and the timing and success of new service introductions by us or our competitors or any other change in the competitive landscape of our market;
pricing pressure as a result of competition or otherwise;
the mix of revenue and associated costs attributable to our various products, which may impact our gross margins and operating income;
the mix of revenue attributable to larger transactions as opposed to smaller transactions and the associated volatility and timing of our transactions;
the mix of subscription, billing, and payment terms, which affects discounts and revenue, and may result in a decrease in gross margins and deferred revenue and impact the timing of cash flows;
the transition of our billing arrangement from multi-year to annual billing, which may impact the timing of billings and collections and result in fluctuations in operating cash flows and free cash flows from period to period;
the loss or deterioration of our channel partnerships and other relationships influencing our sales execution;
changes in customers' budgets and in the timing of their purchasing decisions, including seasonal buying patterns for IT spending;
the timing and success of new product introductions by our competitors and by us;
reputational harm as a result of actual, perceived or purported significant security breaches or incidents impacting, or technological failures, disruptions or difficulties with, our internal networks, systems or data, or our platform and our products;
changes in the legislative or regulatory environment affecting our platform or customers' use of our platform;
fluctuations in stock-based compensation expense;
foreign exchange gains and losses related to operating expenses incurred and any sales denominated in currencies other than the U.S. dollar;
costs related to the acquisition of businesses, talent, technologies, or intellectual property, including potentially significant amortization costs and possible write-downs;
our ability to control costs, including our operating expenses;
the collectability of receivables from customers and channel partners, which may be hindered or delayed if these customers or channel partners experience financial distress;
economic conditions specifically affecting industries in which our customers participate;
military conflicts, natural disasters or other catastrophic events; and
litigation-related costs, settlements, or adverselitigation judgments.
Any one or more of the factors above may result in significant fluctuations in our results of operations. We also intend to continue to invest significantly to grow our business in the near future rather than optimizing for profitability or cash flows.
The variability and unpredictability of our quarterly results of operations or other operating metrics could result in our failure to meet our expectations or those of industry or financial analysts. If we fail to meet or exceed such expectations for these or any other
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reasons, the market price of our Class A common stock could fall substantially, and we could face costly lawsuits, including securities class action suits.
If we do not effectively develop and expand our sales and marketing capabilities, we may be unable to add new customers or increase sales to our existing customers, and our business will be adversely affected.
To increase the number of customers and increase the market acceptance of our platform, we will need to expand our sales and marketing operations, including our domestic and international sales forces. Although we have a channel sales model, our sales representatives typically engage in direct interaction with our prospective customers. Therefore, we continue to be substantially dependent on our sales force to obtain new customers. Increasing our customer base and achieving broader market acceptance of our platform will depend, to a significant extent, on our ability to expand and further invest in our sales and marketing operations and activities, particularly in the United States. There is significant competition for sales personnel with the advanced sales skills and technical knowledge we need. We believe that selling security, networking, and analytics solutions requires particularly talented sales personnel with the ability to communicate the transformative potential of our platform and products. These requirements are heightened as the number and variety of products we offer increases, and in recent periods we have invested significantly in training and recruiting sales personnel to effectively sell our expanding portfolio of products. Our ability to achieve significant growth in revenue in the future will depend, in large part, on our success in recruiting, training and retaining enough talented sales personnel in both the U.S. and international markets.
New hires require significant training and may take significant time before they achieve full productivity. As a result, our new hires and planned hires may not become as productive as we would like, and we may be unable to hire or retain enough qualified individuals in the future. As a result of our rapid growth, a large percentage of our sales and marketing team is new to our company and selling our platform and products, and therefore this team may be less effective than our more seasoned employees. Furthermore, hiring sales personnel in new countries, or expanding our existing presence, requires upfront and ongoing expenditures that we may not recover if the sales personnel fail to achieve full productivity. We cannot predict whether, or to what extent, our sales will increase as we expand our sales force or how long it will take for sales personnel to become productive. The effectiveness of our sales and marketing has also varied over time and, together with the effectiveness of any partners or resellers we may engage, may vary in the future. Our business and operating results may be harmed if our efforts do not generate a correspondingly significant increase in revenue. We may not achieve anticipated revenue growth from expanding our sales force if we are unable to hire, develop and retain talented sales personnel, if our new sales personnel are unable to achievedesired productivity levels in a reasonable period of time, or if our sales and marketing programs are not effective.
Our sales cycle is long and unpredictable, and our sales efforts require considerable time and expense.
The length and unpredictability of the sales cycle for our platform and products makes it difficult to identify a regular cadence to our sales. We and our channel partners are often required to spend significant time and resources to better educate and familiarize potential customers with the value proposition of our platform and products. Customers often view the purchase of our platform and products as a strategic decision and significant investment and, as a result, frequently require considerable time to evaluate, test, and qualify our platform and products, as well as those of our competitors, prior to purchasing our platform and products. Large enterprises and government entities in particular often undertake a significant evaluation process that further lengthens the sales cycle. In 2023, we achieved FedRAMP High certification, and given our limited experience with selling to the government, any sales to government entities could require particularly significant investments of time and expense. In addition, the impact of macroeconomic conditions could materially and adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition by reducing sales, lengthening sales cycles and lowering prices for our platform and products. During the sales cycle, we expend significant time and money on sales and marketing and contract negotiation activities, which ultimately may not result in a sale. Additional factors that may influence the length and variability of our sales cycle include:
the discretionary nature of purchasing and budget cycles and decisions;
lengthy purchasing approval processes;
the evaluation of competing products during the purchasing process;
the time, complexity, and expense involved in replacing existing solutions;
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announcements or planned introductions of new products, features, or functionality by us or our competitors;
the practice of large enterprises often driving their purchasing cycles based on internal factors rather than marketing cycles; and
evolving functionality demands.
Our sales force develops relationships directly with our customers, and together with our channel account teams, works with our channel partners on account penetration, coordination, sales and overall market development. We spend substantial time and resources on our sales efforts without any assurance that our efforts will produce a sale. Platform purchases are frequently subject to budget constraints, multiple approvals and unanticipated administrative, processing and other delays. As a result, it is difficult to predict whether and when a sale will be completed.
If our efforts in pursuing sales and customers are unsuccessful, or if our sales cycles lengthen, our revenue could be lower than expected, which would have an adverse effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition.
We recognize most of our revenue ratably over the term of our agreements with customers and, as a result, downturns or upturns in sales may not be immediately reflected in our operating results and may be difficult to discern.
Our platform and products are sold under a subscription model, with typical terms of one to three years. Our business, results of operations, and financial condition could be materially and adversely affected if we fail to successfully manage our subscription model, which depends upon our ability to, among other things, properly price our subscription-based arrangements, maintain systems and processes to properly account for and administer subscriptions, deliver our platform and products, retain our customers, and further develop or acquire related technologies and infrastructure.
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We recognize most of our revenue ratably over the terms of our agreements with customers. As a result, a portion of the revenue that we report in each period will be derived from the recognition of deferred revenue relating to agreements entered into during previous periods. Consequently, a decline in new subscription sales or renewals in any one period may not be immediately reflected in our revenue results for that period. This decline, however, will negatively affect our revenue in future periods. Additionally, subscriptions that are invoiced annually in advance or multi-year in advance contribute significantly to our short-term and long-term deferred revenue. We recently shifted more of our business to annual billing of multi-year contracts. As a result, our growth rate of billings and deferred revenues has declined and we expect it to continue to decline in subsequent quarters, and we may experience negative growth in billings or deferred revenue in certain quarters in the future. Accordingly, the effect of downturns or upturns in market acceptance of our platform and products, in new sales and our rate of renewals may not be fully reflected in our results of operations until future periods. Although our contracts are generally non-cancellable, customers could request to cancel existing arrangements under certain circumstances, which would adversely impact our results of operations.
We expect to continue to invest in research and development, sales and marketing, network infrastructure, general and administrative functions, and other areas to grow our business. We may also be unable to reduce our cost structure in line with a significant deterioration in sales or renewals. Such costs are generally expensed as incurred (with the exception of sales commissions and certain research and development costs), as compared to the corresponding revenue, substantially all of which is recognized ratably in future periods. As a result, we are likely to recognize the costs associated with these investments earlier than some of the anticipated benefits, and the return on these investments may develop more slowly, or may be lower, than we expect, which could adversely affect our operating results.
We face intense competition in our market, both from larger, well-established companies and from emerging companies, and we may lack sufficient financial and other resources to maintain and improve our competitive position.
The market for security, networking, and analytics is intensely competitive and is characterized by constant change and innovation. We face competition from large, well-known companies that offer security, networking, and/or analytics within their product portfolios, and vendors with whom we have not traditionally competed but who may either introduce new products or incorporate features into existing products that compete with our platform and products. Our primary competitors include companies such as Broadcom, Cisco, Fortinet, Palo Alto Networks, and Zscaler. We consider the following types of companies our competitors or potential competitors:
independent IT security vendors, which offer a mix of network and/or security products;
large networking and other vendors that offer security appliances and/or incorporate security capabilities into their networking products and other services;
companies with point solutions that compete with some of the features of our platform and products, such as proxy, firewall, cloud access security broker, sandboxing and advanced threat protection, data lossprevention, encryption, load balancing, and virtual private network; and
other providers of IT security services that offer, or may leverage related technologies to introduce, products that compete with or are alternatives to our platform and products.
Many of our existing competitors have, and some of our potential competitors could have, substantial competitive advantages such as:
greater name recognition, longer operating histories and larger customer bases;
larger sales and marketing budgets and resources;
broader distribution and established relationships with channel partners and customers;
greater customer support resources;
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greater resources to make acquisitions and enter into strategic partnerships;
lower labor and research and development costs;
larger and more mature intellectual property rights portfolios; and
substantially greater financial, technical and other resources.
Our competitors may be successful in convincing IT decision makers that legacy appliance-based security, networking, and analytics solutions or hybrid cloud solutions based on legacy technology are sufficient to meet their security, networking, and analytics needs and provide security, networking, and analytics performance that competes with our platform and products. Our competitors may also seek to extend or supplement their existing offerings to provide security, networking, and analytics solutions that more closely compete with our offerings. Further, many organizations have invested substantial personnel and financial resources to design and operate their appliance-based networks and have established deep relationships with appliance vendors. As a result, these organizations may prefer to purchase from their existing suppliers rather than add or switch to a new supplier.
Some of our larger competitors have substantially broader and more diverse product and services offerings, which may allow them to leverage their relationships based on other products or incorporate functionality into existing products to gain business in a manner that discourages users from purchasing our platform and products, including through selling at zero or negative margins, offering free services and other concessions, bundling products or maintaining closed technology platforms. Many competitors that specialize in providing protection from a single type of security threat may be able to deliver these targeted security products to the market more quickly than we can or to convince organizations that these limited products meet their needs.
In addition, merger and acquisition transactions in the technology industry continue to occur, particularly transactions involving cloud-based technologies. Accordingly, there is a greater likelihood that we will compete with other large technology companies in the future. Some of our competitors have made acquisitions or entered into strategic relationships to offer a more comprehensive product than they individually had offered. Companies and alliances resulting from these possible consolidations and partnerships may create more compelling product offerings and be able to offer more attractive pricing, making it more difficult for us to compete effectively. In addition, continued industry consolidation may adversely impact customers' perceptions of the viability of small and medium-sized technology companies and consequently their willingness to purchase from those companies.
New start-up companies that innovate and competitors that are making significant investments in research and development may invent similar or superior products and technologies that compete with our platform and products, and our business could be materially and adversely affected if such technologies or products are widely adopted. Conditions in our market could change rapidly and significantly as a result of technological advancements, partnering by our competitors, or continuing market consolidation. These competitive pressures in our market or our failure to compete effectively may result in price reductions, fewer orders, reduced revenue, and gross margins, increased net losses, and loss of market share. Any failure to meet and address these factors would adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition
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If we fail to effectively manage our growth, we may be unable to execute our business plan, maintain high levels of service, adequately address competitive challenges or maintain our corporate culture, and our business, results of operations, and financial condition would be harmed.
Our business has experienced significant growth and is becoming increasingly complex. As our operations have expanded, we have increased our global workforce and broadened the geographic footprint in which we operate. We have also continued to grow our customer base and the number of markets in which we serve customers. We expect this growth to continue. This growth has placed and may continue to place significant demands on our operational infrastructure, financial resources and management team. To effectively manage this growth, we have made, and plan to continue to make, substantial investments to improve our operational, financial, and management controls, as well as our reporting systems and procedures. Our success will depend in part on our ability to manage this complexity effectively without undermining our corporate culture, which we believe has been central to our success. These and other improvements in our systems and controls will require significant capital expenditures and the allocation of valuable management and employee resources. If we fail to implement these improvements effectively, our ability to manage our expected growth, ensure uninterrupted operation of our platform and key business systems and comply with the rules and regulations applicable to public companies could be impaired, the quality of our platform and products could suffer and we may not be able to adequately address competitive challenges.
As our customer base continues to grow, we likely will need to expand our professional services and other personnel, and maintain and enhance our existing partner network, to provide a high level of customer service. We also will need to effectively manage our direct and indirect sales processes as the number and type of our sales personnel and channel partners continue to grow and become more complex, particularly to the extent we continue to expand into new geographies and vertical markets. This complexity is further driven by the number of products offered through our platform and the various ways in which we sell our platform and products, including on a per subscription or bundled basis. If we do not effectively manage the increasing complexity of our business and operations and the integration of new products, features and functionality added to our platform, the quality of our platform, products, and customer service could suffer and we may not be able to compete effectively. These factors could impair our ability, and our channel partners' ability, to attract new customers, retain existing customers, expand our customers' use of our platform and products, and continue to provide high levels of customer service, all of which would adversely affect our reputation, overall business, results of operations, and financial condition.
In addition, we believe that our corporate culture has been a contributor to our success, which we believe fosters innovation, teamwork and an emphasis on customer-focused results. We also believe that our culture creates an environment that drives and perpetuates our strategy and cost-effective distribution approach. In the past we have, and in the future we may, restructure or reduce our workforce to align people, roles and projects to our strategic priorities. Any restructuring, reduction or realignment in the workforce has the potential to negatively impact employee morale or make it more difficult to attract and retain talent. As we continue to grow, or if we undertake future restructuring efforts, we may find it difficult to maintain our corporate culture. Preservation of our corporate culture is also made more difficult by our hybrid work environment, and most of our employees continue to work from home on a full time or part time basis. Any failure to preserve our culture could harm our future success, including our ability to retain and recruit personnel, innovate, operate effectively, and execute on our business strategy. If we experience any of these effects in connection with future growth, it could materially impair our ability to attract new customers, support and retain existing customers and expand their use of our platform, all of which would materially and adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Seasonality may cause fluctuations in our sales and results of operations.
Historically, we have experienced seasonality in sales, as we typically experience a higher percentage of our sales to new customers and renewal subscriptions with existing customers in the fourth quarter of our fiscal year. We believe that this results from the procurement, budgeting, and deployment cycles of many of our customers, particularly our enterprise customers, as well as the timing and structure of our sales compensation programs. Because our contracts typically provide for annual up-front payments, this seasonality is reflected in changes to our deferred revenue and remaining performance obligations. This seasonality is reflected to a much lesser extent, and sometimes is not immediately apparent, in revenue, due to the fact that we recognize subscription revenue ratably over the term of the subscription, which is generally one to three years. We expect that this seasonality will continue to affect our sales and results of operations in the future and might become more pronounced as we continue to target larger enterprise customers. We expect that seasonality may also reduce our ability to predict cash flow and optimize the timing of our operating expenses.
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If we are not able to maintain and enhance our brand or reputation as an industry leader and innovator, our business, results of operations and financial condition may be adversely affected.
We believe that maintaining and enhancing our reputation as a leader and innovator in the market for security, networking, and analytics is critical to our relationship with our existing customers and channel partners and our ability to attract new customers. The successful promotion of our brand attributes will depend on a number of factors, including our marketing efforts, our ability to continue to develop high-quality products, functionalities and features, and our ability to successfully differentiate our platform and products from competitive products and services. Our brand promotion activities may not be successful or yield increased revenue. In addition, independent industry analysts often provide reports evaluating our products, as well as those of our competitors, and the perception of our platform and products in the marketplace may be significantly influenced by these reports. If these reports are negative, or less positive as compared to those of our competitors, our reputation may be adversely affected. Additionally, the performance of our channel partners may affect our brand and reputation if customers do not have a positive experience with our platform and products as implemented by our channel partners or with the implementation generally. The promotion of our brand requires us to make substantial expenditures, and we anticipate that the expenditures will increase as our market becomes more competitive, as we expand into new geographies and vertical markets, and as more sales are generated through our channel partners. To the extent that these activities yield increased revenue, this revenue may not offset the increased expenses we incur. If we do not successfully maintain and enhance our brand and reputation, the demand for our platform and products may decline, and our business, results of operations and financial condition may be adversely affected.
Our international operations expose us to significant risks, and failure to manage those risks could materially and adversely impact our business, results of operations and financial condition.
Historically, we have derived a significant portion of our revenue from outside the United States. During fiscal 2026, EMEA and APJ contributed 25% and 19% of our revenue, respectively, representing 36% and 30% year-over-year growth. As of January 31, 2026, approximately 67% of our full-time employees were located outside of the United States. We have offices in the United Kingdom, France, Spain, India, Taiwan, and other locations. We also host our network of data centers in 80 unique regions with more than 200 localization zones globally. We are continuing to adapt to and develop strategies to address international markets and our growth strategy includes continued expansion into target geographies, but there is no guarantee that such efforts will be successful. We expect that our international operations will continue to grow in the future, as we continue to pursue opportunities in international markets. These international operations will require significant management attention and financial resources and are subject to substantial risks, including:
political, economic and social uncertainty or international conflict;
unexpected costs for the localization of our platform and products, including translation into foreign languages and adaptation for local practices and regulatory requirements;
greaterdifficulty in enforcing contracts and accounts receivable collection, and longer collection periods;
reduced or uncertain protection for intellectual property rights in some countries;
greater risk of unexpected changes in regulatory practices, tariffs and tax laws and treaties;
greater risk of a failure of foreign employees, partners, distributors and resellers to comply with both U.S. and foreign laws, including antitrust regulations, anti-bribery laws, export and import control laws, trade and economic sanctions and any applicable trade regulations ensuring fair trade practices;
requirements to comply with foreign laws and regulations relating to privacy, data protection, cybersecurity and information security and the risks and costs of noncompliance;
increased expenses incurred in establishing and maintaining office space and equipment for our international operations;
difficulties in complying with laws and regulations relating to AI and ML or applicable to specific industries such as finance;
greaterdifficulty in identifying, attracting and retaining local qualified personnel, and the costs and expenses associated with such activities;
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differing employment laws and practices, and labor relations issues;
difficulties in managing and staffing international offices and increased travel, infrastructure and legal compliance costs associated with multiple international locations;
fluctuations in exchange rates between the U.S. dollar and foreign currencies in markets where we do business and related impact on sales cycles; and
the impact of military conflicts, natural disasters and catastrophic events on customers, partners, suppliers, employees, and the global economy.
As we continue to develop and grow our business globally, our success will depend, in part, on our ability to anticipate and effectively manage these risks. The expansion of our existing international operations and entry into additional international markets will require significant management attention and financial resources. Our failure to successfully manage our international operations and the associated risks could limit the future growth of our business.
We rely on a limited number of vendors and suppliers globally for certain equipment, software, and services that we use to operate our platform and products, and any disruption, whether as a result of tariffs or otherwise, in the availability or price of such equipment, software, and services could increase our expenses or delay our ability to expand or increase the capacity of our global data center network or otherwise operate our business.
We rely on a limited number of vendors and suppliers globally for certain of the equipment, software and services we use to operate our global data center network and provide our platform and products to our customers, including sole or limited sourced hardware, software and Software-as-a-Service ("SaaS") services. Our reliance on these vendors and suppliers exposes us to risks, including reduced control over costs and constraints based on the then-current availability, terms and pricing offered by these vendors and suppliers. For example, we generally purchase equipment or the components of equipment on a purchase order basis, with future delivery dates, but do not have long-term contracts guaranteeing supply beyond our purchase orders. In addition, the technology industry has experienced component shortages, delivery delays, price increases and service interruptions in the past, and we may experience shortages, delays, materially increased costs or service interruptions in the future, including as a result of natural disasters, acts of war or international conflicts, epidemics or global pandemics, increased demand in the industry, trade policy, or if our suppliers do not have sufficient rights to supply the components in all jurisdictions in which we may host our platform and products. While global economic conditions have not had a material impact on our supply chain to date, these conditions have increased our costs in the past and could result in disruptions and delays for components in the future. For example, industry demand to build new data centers to support the rapid expansion of AI has increased the cost of components and hardware we use in our global network infrastructure, and while we have sufficient quantities of components and hardware for our near term expansion plans, the cost of building new data centers in the future could significantly impact our expenses or affect the expansion of our global network. There is a risk that current geopolitical, diplomatic and other developments affecting the relationship between China and Taiwan may materially and negatively impact the availability of certain critical components that we use in our data centers, which we source from overseas. The availability or price of such components may also be impacted by global trade policy, including the introduction or modification of tariffs affecting such components. For example, the current U.S. presidential administration has and may continue to impose tariffs on countries globally. If our supply of certain components is disrupted or delayed, there can be no assurance that available alternatives can serve as adequate replacements for the existing components or that alternatives will be available on terms that are favorable to us, if at all. Concentration among the vendors who host our co-located data centers may also increase our costs and exposure to business disruptions arising from our relationships with such vendors, including in the event that such vendors experienced a material service interruption or in the event that we are unable to renew our agreements with such vendors on terms that are favorable to us, if at all. Any disruption or delay in access to components, critical software and services that we use to operate our business may increase our costs, delay opening new data centers, delay increasing capacity or replacing defective equipment at existing data centers, or cause other constraints on our operations that could damage our channel partner or customer relationships or otherwise have a material adverse impact on our business.
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Adverse economic conditions or reduced security, networking, or analytics spending may adversely impact our revenue and profitability.
Our operations, performance and growth depend in part on worldwide economic conditions and the impact these conditions have on levels of spending on security, networking, and analytics. Our business depends on the overall demand for security, networking, and analytics and on the economic health and general willingness of our current and prospective customers to purchase our platform and products. A broad reduction in security, networking, or analytics spending would have a material impact to our business.
The United States and the global economy have in the past few years experienced high levels of inflation. While inflation rates have recently moderated, the existence of inflation in the U.S. and global economy and the pricing pressure created by rising inflation in prior periods has resulted, and may continue to result, in high interest rates and capital costs, shipping costs, supply shortages, increased costs of labor, weakening exchange rates and other similar effects. Elevated inflation rates can affect our expenses, especially employee compensation. In addition, rising interest rates could adversely affect the value of our investments and cash on hand and increase our borrowing costs. Inflation and related increases in interest rates could also increase our customers' operating costs, which could result in reduced security, networking, or analytics budgets, less demand for our platform and products, or delays in new orders, renewals or payments due to us. Because our customer contracts have typical terms of one to three years and are generally billed annually in advance, whereas our expenses in delivering cloud security platform are generally expensed as incurred, our ability to adjust our pricing in a timely manner in response to inflation or other macroeconomic conditions is limited.
Governments have implemented and are implementing fiscal policy interventions in response to high levels of inflation, including raising interest rates or keeping them at elevated levels. These interventions may also reduce economic growth rates, create recessions and increase unemployment rates. This could have an adverse effect on our consolidated financial condition and results of operations. For example, if our customers were to reduce their IT budgets or workforces in response to deteriorating economic conditions, they may not purchase or renew subscriptions for our platform and products or may renew for fewer products or users.
In addition, we or our customers may be affected by changes in trade policies, treaties, government regulations, and tariffs, as well as geopolitical volatility. For example, uncertainty as to the impact of the imposition of tariffs on certain countries by the current U.S. presidential administration, as well as any potential retaliatory measures by impacted trade partners, could adversely impact trade relations, result in higher costs, and thereby decrease the purchasing power of our customers, which could delay purchasing decisions, impact payment terms and collections, increase pressure on us to provide discounts, and create general market instability. Trade protection measures, retaliatory actions, tariffs and increased barriers, policies favoring domestic industries, or increased import or export licensing requirements or restrictions could have a negative effect on the overall macro economy and our customers, and our ability to sell our products or deliver services in certain jurisdictions, which could have an adverse impact on our operating results.
The impact of economic conditions, including the ongoing effects of inflation, high interest rates, trade policy, and regional or global recessions could materially and adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition in a number of ways, including by reducing sales, lengthening sales cycles and requiring us to lower prices for our platform and products.
Our ability to maintain customer satisfaction depends in part on the quality of our customer support, including the quality of the support provided on our behalf by certain channel partners. Failure to maintain high-quality customer support could have an adverse effect on our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
If we do not provide high quality support to our customers, our ability to renew subscriptions, increase the number of users and sell additional products to customers may be adversely affected. We believe that successfully delivering our platform and products requires a highly skilled level of customer support and engagement. We or our channel partners must assist our customers to deploy our platform and products, resolve performance issues, address interoperability challenges with a customer's existing network and security infrastructure and respond to security threats and cyberattacks. Many enterprises, particularly large organizations, have very complex networks and require high levels of focused support to fully realize the benefits of our platform. Any failure by us to maintain the expected level of support could reduce customer satisfaction and hurt our customer retention, particularly with respect to our large enterprise customers. Additionally, if our channel partners do not provide support to the satisfaction of our customers, particularly with implementation of our platform and products, we may be required to supplement their customer support ourselves, which would require us to hire additional personnel and to invest in additional resources. We may not be able to hire such resources fast enough to keep up with demand, particularly if the sales of our platform exceed our internal forecasts. We may also not be
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successful in our efforts to fully onboard new hires and provide adequate training to our employees, many of whom continue to work remotely. To the extent that we or our channel partners are unsuccessful in hiring, training and retaining adequate support resources, our ability and the ability of our channel partners to provide adequate and timely support to our customers will be negatively impacted, and our customers' satisfaction with our platform could be adversely affected. We currently rely in part on contractors provided by third-party service providers internationally to provide support services to our customers, and we expect to expand our international customer service support team to other countries. Any failure to properly train or oversee such contractors could result in a poor customer experience and an adverse impact on our reputation and ability to renew subscriptions or engage new customers. Furthermore, as we sell our platform and products internationally, our support organization faces additional challenges, including those associated with delivering support, training and documentation in languages other than English. Any failure to maintain high-quality customer support, or a market perception that we do not maintain high-quality support, could materially harm our reputation, adversely affect our ability to sell our platform and products to existing and prospective customers and could harm our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Our success depends on the experience and expertise of our senior management team and key employees, particularly our co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, and if we are unable to hire, retain, train, and motivate our personnel, our business, operating results, and prospects may be harmed.
Our success has depended, and continues to depend, on the efforts and talents of our senior management team and key employees, including our leadership team, engineers, product managers, sales and marketing personnel, and professional services personnel. In particular, we are highly dependent on the services of Sanjay Beri, our co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, who is critical to our future vision and strategic direction. We rely on our leadership team in the areas of operations, security, marketing, sales, support and general and administrative functions, and on individual contributors on our research and development team. Although we have entered into employment agreements with our key personnel, these agreements have no specific duration and constitute at-will employment. Our future success will also depend upon our continued ability to identify, hire, and retain additional skilled and highly qualified personnel, which will require significant time, expense, and attention. In addition, changes to U.S. immigration policies, particularly to H-1B and other visa programs, and restrictions on travel could restrain the flow of technical and professional talent into the U.S. and may inhibit our ability to hire qualified personnel.
The majority of our employees, including all of our officers and key employees, are employed on an at-will basis, which means that they could terminate their employment with us at any time. The loss of one or more members of our senior management team, particularly if closely grouped, could adversely affect our ability to execute our business plan and thus, our business, operating results, and prospects. We do not maintain key man insurance on any of our officers or key employees, and we may not be able to find adequate replacements.
Competition for well-qualified employees in all aspects of our business, including sales, professional services, network engineering, AI/ML, and software engineering, is intense. We have from time to time experienced, and may in the future have, difficulty hiring and retaining employees with appropriate qualifications, and many of the companies with which we compete for experienced personnel have greater resources than we have. If we hire employees from our competitors or other companies, these employees' former employers may attempt to assert that we or these employees have breached legal obligations, resulting in a diversion of our time and resources. We may need to invest significant amounts of cash and equity to attract and retain new employees, and we may never realize returns on these investments. Additionally, many of our employees may be able to receive significant proceeds from sales of our Class A common stock in the public markets, which may reduce their motivation to continue to work for us. If the perceived value of our stock awards declines, it may adversely affect our ability to recruit and retain highly skilled employees. If we are unable to hire, retain, train, and motivate our personnel, our business, operating results, and prospects may be harmed.
We have limited experience with our pricing models, and changes in our subscription or pricing models could adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.
We generate revenue primarily from subscriptions to our platform and products, together with related support services. We offer subscription plans that combine multiple products, and also offer separate subscriptions to individual products and platform functionalities. We have limited experience with respect to determining the optimal prices and pricing models for our subscription plans and products. As the markets for our products mature, as we enter into newer product markets for our business, or as competitors
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introduce new products or services that compete with ours, we may adjust our subscription or pricing models (including changing the timing of customers' payments over the course of their subscriptions) or promotional programs. Any decrease in the sales prices for access to our platform and products, without a corresponding decrease in costs or increase in sales volume, would adversely affect our revenue, gross margin, financial condition, and cash flow.
We also have limited experience in determining which products and functionality to offer as part of our subscription plans and which to offer as separate products. Our limited experience in determining the optimal manner in which to bundle our various products and functionalities could reduce our ability to capture the value delivered by our offerings, which could adversely impact our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
We provide service level commitments under our customer contracts. If we fail to meet these contractual commitments, we could be obligated to provide credits for future service and our business could suffer.
Our customer agreements contain service level commitments, which contain specifications regarding the availability and performance of our platform and products. Any failure of or disruption to our infrastructure could impact the performance or availability of our platform and products. If we are unable to meet our stated service level commitments or if we suffer extended periods of poor performance or unavailability of our platform and products, we may be contractually obligated to provide affected customers with service credits for future subscriptions, and, in certain cases, refunds. In addition, the limitation of liability provisions in our customer agreements may not fully or effectively protect us from claims as a result of federal, state or local laws or ordinances or unfavorable judicial decisions in the United States or other countries. We have at times made payments or issued customers credits arising under our service level commitments. Our reputation could be adversely affected, and our revenue, other results of operations and financial condition could be harmed, if we suffer performance issues or downtime that exceeds the service level commitments under our agreements with our customers, particularly if such issues are widespread.
Our future growth depends, in part, on sales to government entities, which are subject to a number of challenges and risks.
We derived approximately 11%, 10%, and 10%, respectively, of our revenue from sales of our platform and products to federal, state, local, and foreign governments and public universities in fiscal 2026, fiscal 2025, and fiscal 2024 and a part of our growth strategy is to pursue successful procurement of government and other public sector contracts. Factors that could impede our ability to maintain or increase the amount of revenue derived from the public sector include:
changes in fiscal or contracting policies;
decreases in overall levels of government spending or available government funding;
changes in government programs or applicable requirements;
the adoption of new laws or regulations or changes to existing laws or regulations; and
delays or changes in the government appropriations or other funding authorization processes, including government shutdown.
The occurrence of any of the foregoing could cause governments, governmental agencies, and others in the public sector to delay or refrain from purchasing our platform and products or otherwise have an adverse effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition.
Additionally, the sale of our platform and products to the public sector is tied to budget cycles, and there are government requirements and authorizations that we may be required to meet. Further, we may be subject to audits and investigations relating to the contracts we enter into with the public sector, and violations could result in penalties and sanctions, including contract termination, refunding or forfeiting payments, fines and suspension, or debarment from future public sector business. Selling to these entities can be highly competitive, expensive, and time consuming, often requiring significant upfront time and expense. Public sector entities often require contract terms that differ from our standard arrangements and impose additional compliance requirements, require increased attention to pricing practices, or are otherwise time consuming and expensive to satisfy. For example, some of our government entity customers contract with us on the basis of our authorization under FedRAMP, which has in the past required and may in the future require us to undertake additional actions and expense to ensure compliance. Public sector entities may also have statutory, contractual, or other legal rights to terminate contracts with us or our partners for convenience, for lack of funding, or due to
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a default, and any such termination may adversely impact our future results of operations. If we represent that we meet certain standards, authorizations (such as FedRAMP), or requirements and do not meet them, or if such authorizations are suspended or revoked, we could be subject to increased liability from our customers, investigation by regulators, or termination rights. Even if we do meet them, the additional costs associated with providing our service to public sector entities could harm our margins. Moreover, changes in underlying regulatory requirements could be an impediment to our ability to efficiently provide our service to public sector customers and to grow or maintain our customer base. Any of these risks related to contracting with public sector entities could adversely impact our future sales and results of operations or make them more difficult to predict.
Future acquisitions, strategic investments, partnerships, or alliances could be difficult to identify and integrate, divert the attention of key management personnel, disrupt our business, dilute stockholder value, and adversely affect our results of operations, financial condition, and prospects.
In the future, we expect that our business strategy may include acquisitions of other companies, products, and technologies. As a function of the industry in which we operate, we may acquire development stage companies that are not yet profitable, and that require continued investment, which could adversely affect our results of operations and liquidity as well as our ability to meet expectations or financial guidance, particularly if such expectations or guidance predate such acquisitions. Development stage companies generally involve a higher degree of risk as compared to later stage companies and have not been proven, require additional capital to develop, and typically do not generate enough revenue to offset increased expenses associated therewith. We also may enter into other strategic relationships with other businesses, which could involve joint ventures, preferred or exclusive licenses, additional channels of distribution, or investments in other companies.
Identifying candidates for strategic transactions can be difficult, time-consuming, and costly, and we may not be able to successfully complete identified strategic transactions. The risks we face in connection with strategic transactions include:
an acquisition may negatively affect our operating results or balance sheet because it may require us to incur charges or assume substantial levels of debt or other liabilities, may cause adverse tax consequences or unfavorable accounting treatment, may expose us to claims and disputes by stockholders and third parties, including intellectual property claims and disputes, or may not generate sufficient financial return to offset additional costs and expenses related to the acquisition;
we may encounter difficulties or unforeseen expenditures in integrating the business, technologies, products, personnel, or operations of any company that we acquire;
a strategic transaction may disrupt our ongoing business, divert resources, increase our expenses, and distract our management;
an acquisition may result in a delay or reduction of customer purchases for both us and the company acquired due to customer uncertainty about continuity and effectiveness of service from either company;
we may encounter difficulties in, or may be unable to, successfully sell any acquired products;
our use of cash in strategic transactions would limit other potential uses for our cash;
if we incur debt to fund any strategic transactions, such debt may subject us to material restrictions on our ability to conduct our business; and
if we issue a significant amount of equity securities in connection with future strategic transactions, existing stockholders may be diluted and earnings per share may decrease.
The occurrence of any of these risks could adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
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If we are unable to effectively manage certain risks and challenges related to our operations in India and Taiwan, our business could be harmed.
We believe that our significant presence in India and Taiwan provides important advantages for our business, such as direct access to a large pool of skilled professionals. However, it also creates certain risks that we must effectively manage. As of January 31, 2026, 29.5% of our global work force was based in India and 8.0% of our global work force was based in Taiwan, comprised mostly of R&D, support and operations professionals. Wage costs in India and Taiwan for skilled professionals are currently lower than in the United States for comparably skilled professionals. However, wages and benefit costs in India and Taiwan are increasing at a faster rate than in the United States, which could result in us incurring increased costs for technical professionals at a faster rate. There is intense competition in India and Taiwan for skilled technical professionals, and we expect this competition to increase. As a result, we may be unable to retain our current employee base in India and Taiwan or hire additional new talent or do so cost-effectively. In addition, India has recently experienced significant inflation and low economic growth. India also has experienced natural disasters, civil unrest and terrorism and, in the past, has been involved in conflicts with neighboring countries. If we are unable to effectively manage any of the foregoing risks related to our India and Taiwan operations, our development efforts and operations could be impaired, which could materially and negatively impact our growth and operating results.
If our estimates or judgments relating to our critical accounting policies prove to be incorrect, or financial reporting standards or interpretations change, our operating results could be adversely affected.
The preparation of financial statements in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles ("GAAP") requires management to make estimates and assumptions that affect the amounts reported in our consolidated financial statements and accompanying notes. We base our estimates on historical experience and on various other assumptions that we believe to be reasonable under the circumstances, as described in the section titled "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations." The results of these estimates form the basis for making judgments about the carrying values of assets, liabilities, and equity and the amount of revenue and expenses that are not readily apparent from other sources. Significant assumptions and estimates used in preparing our consolidated financial statements include those related to the fair value allocation of multiple performance obligations in revenue recognition, the assumptions underlying the fair value used for equity-based compensation expense, the fair value of our 3.75% Convertible Senior Paid In Kind ("PIK") Toggle Notes due 2027 (as amended to extend the maturity date to 2028, (the "2028 Notes") and our 3.00% Convertible Senior PIK Toggle Notes due 2029 (the "2029 Notes" and, together with the 2028 Notes, the "Convertible Notes") and estimated useful lives, and impairment of intangible assets and goodwill arising from business combinations. Our operating results may be adversely affected if our assumptions change or if actual circumstances differ from those in our assumptions, which could cause our operating results to fall below the expectations of securities analysts and investors, resulting in a decline in the trading price of our Class A common stock.
Additionally, changes in existing accounting or taxation rules or practices, new accounting pronouncements or taxation rules, or varying interpretations of current accounting pronouncements or taxation practice could harm our operating results or the manner in which we conduct our business. Further, such changes could potentially affect our reporting of transactions completed before such changes are effective.
GAAP is subject to interpretation by the Financial Accounting Standards Board, the SEC, and various bodies formed to promulgate and interpret appropriate accounting principles. A change in these principles or interpretations could have a significant effect on our reported financial results and could affect the reporting of transactions completed before the announcement of a change. Adoption of such new standards and any difficulties in implementation of changes in accounting principles, including the ability to modify our accounting systems, could cause us to fail to meet our financial reporting obligations, which could result in regulatory discipline and harm investors' confidence in us.
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We rely on third parties for certain essential financial and operational services, and a failure or disruption in these services could materially and adversely affect our ability to manage our business effectively.
We rely on third parties to provide many essential financial and operational services to support our business. Many of these vendors are less established and have shorter operating histories than traditional software vendors. Moreover, these vendors provide their services to us via a cloud-based model instead of software that is installed on our premises. As a result, we depend upon these vendors to maintain the security of their services and provide us with services that are always available and are free of errors or defects that could cause disruptions in our business processes. Any failure by these vendors to do so, such as a compromise in security or any disruption in our ability to access their services or the internet, would materially and adversely affect our ability to manage our operations, and could adversely affect our reputation.
We track certain business and operational metrics, which are subject to inherent challenges in measurement, and actual or perceived inaccuracies in such metrics may harm our reputation and materially adversely affect our stock price, business, results of operations, and financial condition.
We track certain business and operational metrics, including metrics such as NRR, which may differ from estimates or similar metrics published by third parties due to differences in sources, methodologies, or the assumptions on which we rely. Our internal systems and tools are subject to a number of limitations, and our methodologies for tracking these metrics may change over time, which could result in unexpected changes to our metrics, including any metrics we publicly disclose. If the internal systems and tools we use to track these metrics undercount or overcount performance or contain algorithmic or other technical errors, the data we report may not be accurate. Investors should not place undue reliance on these metrics as an indicator of our future or expected results. If investors or analysts do not perceive any metrics we publicly disclose to be accurate representations of our business, or if we discover material inaccuracies in such metrics, our reputation, business, results of operations, and financial condition would be harmed.
Our estimated market opportunity and forecasts of our market and market growth may prove to be inaccurate. Moreover, even if our estimate of the market size is accurate, there can be no assurance that we will serve a significant portion of the market, and even if our estimated market opportunityachieves the forecasted growth, there can be no assurance that our business will grow at similar rates, or at all.
Our estimated market opportunity and growth forecasts included in this Annual Report on 10-K relating to our market opportunity and the expected growth in those markets are subject to significant uncertainty and are based on assumptions and estimates, which may prove to be inaccurate. The markets for cloud-based security, networking, analytics, and AI security are at an early stage and are rapidly evolving. As a result, the size and future growth of these markets are difficult to accurately estimate and subject to change. In addition, third-party estimates of our addressable markets reflect the opportunity available from all participants and potential participants, and we cannot predict with precision our ability to address this demand or the extent of market adoption of our platform and products.
Moreover, the market segments we are targeting may grow at different rates. The variables that go into the calculation of our market opportunity are subject to change over time, and there is no guarantee that any particular number or percentage of addressable businesses covered by our market opportunity estimates will purchase our products or generate any particular level of revenue for us. Any expansion in our market opportunity depends on a number of factors, including the cost, performance, and perceived value associated with our products and the products of our competitors. Moreover, even if this market meets our size estimate and experiences the forecasted growth, there can be no assurance that our business will serve a significant portion of this market, and we may not grow our business at a similar rate or at all. Our growth is subject to many factors, including our success in implementing our business strategy, which is subject to many risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, our estimated market opportunity and the forecasts of market growth included in this Annual Report on 10-K should not be taken as indicative of our future growth.
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We are exposed to fluctuations in currency exchange rates, which could negatively affect our results of operations.
Our sales contracts are primarily denominated in U.S. dollars, and therefore, most of our revenue is not subject to foreign currency risk. However, in the event of a strengthening of the U.S. dollar against foreign currencies in which we conduct business, the cost of our products to our end-customers outside of the United States would increase, which could lead to a decline in the demand for our platform and products, which could, in turn, adversely affect our financial condition and operating results. The deterioration of currencies in which our customers do business could also increase the likelihood of non-payment and result in requests for concessions or cancellations by customers having significant exposures to such currencies. In addition, increased international sales in the future, including through our channel partners and other partnerships or as a result of our acquisitions, may result in increased foreign currency denominated sales, increasing our foreign currency risk.
Our operating expenses incurred outside the United States and denominated in foreign currencies are generally increasing and are subject to fluctuations due to changes in foreign currency exchange rates. If we are not able to successfully hedge against the risks associated with foreign currency fluctuations, our financial condition and operating results could be adversely affected.
If we become more exposed to currency fluctuations and are not able to successfully hedge against the risks associated with currency fluctuations, our operating results could be materially and adversely affected. Further, unanticipated changes in currency exchange rates may result in poorer overall financial performance.
We are exposed to the credit and liquidity risk of our customers, and to credit exposure in weakened markets, which could result in material losses.
Our sales are made on an open credit basis, according to agreed upon payment terms or contractual billing schedules. Such payment terms or billing schedules subject us to risk of non-payment by our customers, including as a result of insolvency.
Our exposure to the credit risks described above may increase if our customers are adversely affected by a global economic downturn or periods of economic uncertainty. If we are unable to adequately control these risks, our business, operating results, and financial condition could be harmed. In addition, in the past, we have experienced non-material losses due to bankruptcies among customers. If these losses increase due to global economic conditions, they could harm our business and financial condition.
Risks Related to Our Technology and Our Intellectual Property Rights
If we fail to obtain, maintain, protect, defend, or adequately enforce our intellectual property or proprietary rights, our competitive position could be impaired, and we may losevaluable assets, generate reduced revenue, and incur costlylitigation to protect our rights.
We believe our intellectual property and other proprietary rights are an essential asset of our business, and our success and ability to compete depend in part upon protection of our intellectual property and proprietary rights. We rely on a combination of patent, copyright, trademark and trade secret laws, as well as confidentiality procedures and contractual provisions, to establish and protect our intellectual property rights, all of which provide only limited protection. We endeavor to protect our intellectual property and proprietary rights by relying on foreign, federal, state, and common law rights; implementing physical, operational, and managerial protections of our confidential information; and entering into contracts providing for confidentiality obligations, assignment of inventions, licenses of intellectual property and similar contractual terms. The prosecution, defense, enforcement, protection, and maintenance of registrations and applications for registration of intellectual property and proprietary rights require significant resources. Given the costs and expenses of obtaining, maintaining, protecting, exploiting, defending, and enforcing our intellectual property rights, we may choose not to obtain, maintain, protect, exploit, defend, or enforce certain intellectual property rights that later turn out to be important.
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The efforts we have taken to protect our intellectual property and proprietary rights may not be sufficient or effective, and our intellectual property and proprietary rights may be held invalid or unenforceable. Moreover, we cannot assure you that any patents will be issued with respect to our currently pending patent applications in a manner that gives us adequate defensive protection or competitive advantages, or that any patents issued to us will not be challenged, invalidated or circumvented. We have filed for patents in the United States and in certain non-U.S. jurisdictions, but such protections may not be available in all countries in which we operate or in which we seek to enforce our intellectual property rights, or may be difficult to enforce in practice. For example, many foreign countries have compulsory licensing laws under which a patent owner must grant licenses to third parties. In addition, many countries limit the enforceability of patents against certain third parties, including government agencies or government contractors. In these countries, patents may provide limited or no benefit. Moreover, we may need to expend additional resources to defend our intellectual property rights in these countries, and our inability to do so could impair our business or adversely affect our international expansion. Our currently issued patents and any patents that may be issued in the future with respect to pending or future patent applications may not provide sufficiently broad protection or they may not prove to be enforceable in actions againstalleged infringers. Additionally, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and various foreign governmental patent agencies require compliance with a number of procedural, documentary, fee payment and other similar provisions during the patent application process and to maintain issued patents. There are situations in which noncompliance can result in abandonment or lapse of the patent or patent application, resulting in partial or complete loss of patent rights in the relevant jurisdiction. If this occurs, it could materially harm our business, operating results, financial condition and prospects.
We may not be effective in policing unauthorized use of our intellectual property rights, and even if we do detect violations, litigation may be necessary to enforce our intellectual property rights. In addition, our intellectual property may be stolen, including by cybercrimes, and we may not be able to identify the perpetrators or prevent the exploitation of our intellectual property by our competitors or others. Protecting against the unauthorized use of our intellectual property rights, technology and other proprietary rights is expensive and difficult, particularly outside of the United States. Any enforcement efforts we undertake, including litigation, could be time-consuming and expensive and could divert management's attention, either of which could harm our business, operating results and financial condition. Further, attempts to enforce our rights against third parties could also provoke these third parties to assert their own intellectual property or other rights against us, or result in a holding that invalidates or narrows the scope of our rights, in whole or in part. The inability to adequately protect and enforce our intellectual property and other proprietary rights could seriouslyharm our business, operating results, financial condition and prospects. Even if we are able to secure our intellectual property rights, we cannot assure you that such rights will provide us with competitive advantages or distinguish our platform and products from those of our competitors or that our competitors will not independently develop similar technology, duplicate any of our technology, or design around our patents.
While it is our policy to require our employees, contractors, and other parties with whom we conduct business who may be involved in the conception or development of intellectual property for us to execute agreements assigning such intellectual property to us, we may be unsuccessful in executing such an agreement with each party who, in fact, conceives or develops intellectual property that we regard as our own. Additionally, any such assignment of intellectual property rights may not be self-executing or the assignment agreements may be breached, and we may be forced to bring claimsagainst third parties, or defendclaims that they may bring against us, to determine the ownership of what we regard as our intellectual property. Further, although it is our policy to enter into confidentiality agreements with employees and third parties to protect our trade secrets and other proprietary rights, we cannot guarantee that we have entered into such agreements with each party that has or may have had access to our trade secrets, confidential information, software, or other proprietary technology and, even if entered into, these agreements may otherwise fail to effectively prevent disclosure of our proprietary or confidential rights, information, or technologies, may be limited as to their term, or may not
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provide an adequate remedy in the event of unauthorized disclosure, misappropriation, use, or other violation of our trade secrets, confidential information, and other proprietary rights or technologies.
Our use of AI and ML, and the integration of AI and ML within our platform and products, may not be successful and may present business, compliance, and reputational challenges, which could lead to operational or reputational damage, competitive harm, legal and regulatory risk, and additional costs, any of which could adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
We have incorporated, and expect to continue to incorporate, AI and ML into our platform and products. The rapid evolution of AI and ML requires the application of resources to develop, test and maintain our platform and products to help ensure that AI and ML are implemented responsibly in order to benefit our business, while also minimizing any unintended or harmful impact. As with many developing technologies, AI and ML present risks and challenges, many of which may be unknown, that could affect their further development, adoption and use. These risks and challenges could undermine public confidence in AI and ML, which could slow or even halt its adoption and negatively affect our business. Further, quickly-evolving legal and regulatory environments and evolving industry standards and policy recommendations relating to social and ethical issues related to AI and ML, may cause us to incur increased research and development or compliance costs or divert resources from development or other efforts. The use of AI and ML technologies presents emerging ethical issues that could become controversial. As a result of these and other challenges associated with our use, development, and implementation of AI and ML, we may in the future be subject to new and evolving rules and regulations regulating AI in various jurisdictions, such as the European Union's Artificial Intelligence Act and state legislation proposed, and in certain cases enacted, in the U.S. addressing AI, new and evolving applications of data protection, privacy, cybersecurity, information security, intellectual property and other laws, legal claims, demands and liability, regulatory investigations and other proceedings, competitive harm, and brand or reputational harm.
Our ability to introduce new security, networking, and analytics products, features, and functionality is dependent on adequate research and development resources. If we do not adequately fund our research and development efforts, we may not be able to compete effectively, and our business and results of operations may be harmed.
The market in which we compete is relatively new and subject to rapid technological change, evolving industry standards, and changing regulations, as well as changing customer needs, requirements, and preferences. To remain competitive, we must continue to offer new security, networking, and analytics products, features, and functionalities and enhancements to our platform and products. Maintaining adequate research and development resources, such as the appropriate personnel and development technology, to meet the demands of the market, is essential. We may be unable to develop products, features, and functionality internally due to certain constraints, such as hiring and retaining employees with the necessary skills and experience, lack of management ability, or a lack of other research and development resources. Additionally, we have and will continue to incorporate AI into our product development and releases, but there can be no assurance that we will realize the desired or anticipated benefits from AI in a timely or cost-effective manner. Further, many of our competitors expend a considerably greater amount of funds on their respective research and development programs, and those that do not may partner with or be acquired by larger companies resulting in the devotion of greater resources to our competitors' research and development programs. Our failure to maintain adequate research and development resources or to compete effectively with the research and development programs of our competitors would give an advantage to such competitors, and our business, results of operations, and financial condition could be adversely affected. Moreover, our research and development efforts may not successfully anticipate market needs or result in significant new marketable products or enhancements to our platform and products, design improvements, cost savings, revenues, or other expected benefits. Any new products, features, or functionalities that we develop or acquire might not be introduced in a timely or cost-effective manner and might not achieve the broad market acceptance necessary to generate significant revenue. If we are unable to generate an adequate return on such investments, we may not be able to compete effectively, and our business and results of operations may be adversely affected. There can be no assurance that we will successfully identify opportunities for new products, develop and bring new products to market in a timely manner, achieve market acceptance of our platform and products, or that products and technologies developed by others will not render our platform, products, and technologies obsolete or noncompetitive.
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If the global network of data centers that deliver our platform and products was damaged or otherwise failed to meet the requirements of our business, our ability to provide our platform and products to our customers and maintain the performance of our platform and products could be negatively impacted, which could cause our business to suffer.
We currently host our platform and products and serve our customers from a global network of over 125 data centers. While we have electronic access to the components and infrastructure of our platform that are hosted by third parties, we do not control the operation of these facilities. Consequently, we may be subject to service disruptions as well as a lack of adequate support for our data center operations due to reasons that are outside of our direct control. Our data centers are vulnerable to damage and connections to our data centers may be interrupted by a variety of sources, including terrorism, military actions, earthquakes, floods, fires, power loss, system or infrastructure failures, computer viruses, physical or electronic break-ins, human error or interference (including by disgruntled employees, former employees or contractors) and other catastrophic events, some of which may be exacerbated by the effects of climate change. Our data centers may also be subject to national or local administrative actions; changes in government regulations, including, for example, the impact of global economic and other sanctions like those levied in response to the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine; changes to legal or permitting requirements and litigation to stop, limit or delay operations. Despite precautions taken at these facilities, such as disaster recovery and business continuity arrangements, the occurrence of a natural disaster, military strike or an act of terrorism, a decision to close the facilities without adequate notice or other unanticipatedproblems at these facilities could result in interruptions or delays in our platform and products, impede our ability to scale our operations or have other adverse impacts upon our business. In addition, if we do not accurately plan for our infrastructure capacity requirements or experience significant strains on our data center capacity, we may experience delays and additional expenses in arranging new data centers, and our customers could experience performance degradation or service outages that may subject us to financial liabilities, result in customer losses and materially harm our business.
If networks, systems or data used in our business are or are perceived to have been breached or otherwise compromised, our platform and products may be perceived as insecure, our reputation may be damaged and our financial results may be negatively impacted.
Cyber attacks or other cybersecurity breaches, incidents, or disruptions with respect to our networks, systems, or applications, or those of our vendors, including loss or unavailability of, or unauthorized access to, or disclosure or other processing of, our proprietary, confidential, or sensitive information, including personal information, could disrupt our operations, compromise sensitive information related to our business or personal information processed by us or on our behalf, and expose us to liability, which could harm our reputation and adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition. It is virtually impossible for us to entirely mitigate the risk of breaches of our platform or other security incidents affecting our platform or the systems, networks or data used in our business. As we grow, we may become a more attractive target for cyber attacks. Our security, networking, and analytics products analyze and otherwise process proprietary and confidential information, including personal information. Companies in our industry are subject to a wide variety of attacks on their networks and systems. As a well-known provider of security, networking, and analytics, we pose an attractive target for such attacks, and as our footprint grows larger, we may become an even more attractive target for cyber attacks. We and the vendors on which we rely, have previously experienced, and may in the future experience, various cybersecurity incidents and other attempts to access or disrupt our networks, systems, and applications. For example, in February 2023, we experienced a significant denial of service attack, which was mitigated within hours but temporarily impacted performance and some services. We face threats from a variety of sources, including sophisticated nation-state and nation-state supported actors, cyber criminals, terrorists, and politically motivated groups or individuals that pose risks to our networks and systems, our platform, our third-party service providers, and our customers' systems and the proprietary, confidential, or sensitive information, including personal information processed by us or on our behalf. The growth in state sponsored cyber activity, including those actions taken in connection with the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine, showcase the increasing sophistication of cyber threats. As a result, we may be unable to anticipate these techniques or implement adequate measures to prevent an electronic intrusion into our customers through our platform or to prevent breaches and other security incidents affecting our platform, internal networks, systems or data. Further, we may be unable to remediate or otherwise respond to any identified breach or other incident in a timely manner.
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The nature of the attacks perpetratedagainst us and our vendors may include, among others, social engineering attacks (such as deep fakes), targeted phishing attacks, advanced attacks conducted or sponsored by nation-states or affiliated actors, advanced persistentthreat intrusions, ransomware and other malware and malicious code, theft of sensitive information, exploitation of our platform and products as part of a supply chain attack against our customers, distributed-denial-of-service attacks, manipulation of data, ransomware, or others. Any of these attacks, if successful, can lead to significant interruptions in our operations, loss of sensitive data and income, reputational harm, and diversion of funds. We currently expend significant, and may in the future be required to expend significantly more, capital and financial resources to protect against any such threats or to alleviate problems caused by breaches in security.
Moreover, future or past business transactions (such as acquisitions or integrations) could expose us to additional cybersecurity risks and vulnerabilities, as our systems could be negatively affected by vulnerabilities present in acquired or integrated entities' systems and technologies. Furthermore, we may discover security issues that were not found during due diligence of such acquired or integrated entities, and it may be increasingly difficult to integrate companies into our IT environment and security program successfully, or at all. In addition, advances in technology, including increased adoption of artificial intelligence technology by us and third-party partners, and an increased level of sophistication and expertise of hackers (including through the malicious use of artificial intelligence technology), may also increase the risks of cybersecurity incidents.
Despite significant efforts to create security barriers to safeguard against such threats, it is impossible for us to entirely mitigate these risks. Despite our security measures and our cybersecurity risk management program, our and our vendors' IT and infrastructure may be vulnerable to security risks, including loss or theft of, damage to, or unauthorized access to, use, disclosure or other processing of proprietary information or other customer data, employee error or misconduct, denial of service attacks, and other means to disrupt our platform or our or our service providers' networks and systems, and hacking attacks or other cyber attacks originated from our infrastructure. The security measures we have integrated into our networks, systems and platform, which are designed to detect unauthorized activity and help protect our proprietary, confidential, or sensitive information, including personal information, and to help prevent data loss and prevent or minimize security breaches, incidents, or disruptions, may not function as expected or may not be sufficient to protect our internal networks and platform against certain attacks. In addition, techniques used to sabotage or obtain unauthorized access to networks in which data is stored or through which data is transmitted change frequently, generally are not recognized until launched against a target, and may be difficult to discover for an extended period. Even if identified, we may be unable to adequatelyinvestigate or remediate incidents or breaches due to attackers increasingly using tools and techniques that are designed to circumvent controls, to avoid detection, and to remove or obfuscate forensic evidence. For example, threat actors may leverage emerging AI technologies to develop new hacking tools and attack vectors, exploitvulnerabilities, obscure their activities, increase the frequency or intensity of attacks, and increase the difficulty of threat attribution and remediation. Such cyber attacks and other cybersecurity breaches, incidents, or disruptions may continue to evolve in frequency and sophistication, and we may be unable to anticipate these techniques and implement adequate preventative, detection, mitigation or other measures.
If an actual or perceived breach of security occurs with respect to, or an actual or perceived security incident impacts, us or any of our vendors, whether as result of third-party action, employee error, malfeasance, or otherwise, the market perception of the effectiveness of our security measures could be harmed, our brand and reputation could be impacted, we could lose potential sales and existing customers, our ability to operate our business could be impaired, we could be subject to claims, demands and litigation, regulatory audits, investigations, enforcement actions and other proceedings, additional reporting requirements, and restrictions on data processing, and we may be subject to fines or penalties or otherwise incur significant liabilities. Some of our contracts may contain relatively high limitations of liability for such events, and even where they do, there can be no assurance that any such limitations of liability are or will be sufficient to protect us from liabilities, damages, or claims related to any such actual or perceived breaches or incidents. Further, our platform and products may be perceived as less desirable, which could negatively affect our business and damage our reputation. Our ability to retain existing customers, expand product adoption and penetration with our existing customers, and acquire new customers is dependent upon our reputation as a trusted provider of security, networking, and analytics. The importance of our reputation in retaining existing business and acquiring new business is heightened by our focus on enterprise customers. In addition, we have numerous customers that operate in highly-regulated industries in which our customers' data is considered particularly sensitive, such as financial services and healthcare. An actual or perceived security breach or incident could damage our relationships with customers, result in the loss of customers, and make it more challenging to acquire new customers, and such damage would likely be heightened in the event a network or security breach or incident occurred in the highly-regulated industries we serve.
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Our operations involve analyzing and processing our customers' and other third parties' confidential and proprietary information, including, in some cases, personal information. We have legal and contractual obligations with respect to the confidentiality and use of such information. Security incidents impacting our platform or the systems of our third-party service providers could result in a risk of loss of, damage to, or unauthorized access to or acquisition, use, disclosure, or other processing of the information we process on behalf of our customers. Any such actual or perceived incident could require notification under applicable laws and regulations or other actual or asserted obligations to which we are or may become subject and could lead to claims, demands, and litigation, regulatory audits, investigations, enforcement actions, and other proceedings, and fines, penalties and other possible liability, damage our relationships with our existing customers, trigger indemnification and other contractual obligations, cause us to incur investigation, mitigation, and remediation expenses, and have a negative impact on our ability to attract and retain new customers. Furthermore, any such incident, including a breach of our customers' systems, could compromise our networks or networks secured by our platform and products, creating system disruptions or slowdowns and exploiting security vulnerabilities of our or our customers' networks, and the information stored on or otherwise processed by our or our customers' systems could be accessed, disclosed, or otherwise processed without authorization, altered, lost, or stolen, which could subject us to liability and cause us financial harm. An actual or perceived breach of, or incident impacting, our networks, our customers' networks, those of our vendors or other networks secured by our platform and products, whether or not due to a vulnerability in our platform, may also undermine confidence in our platform or our industry and result in expenditure of significant resources in efforts to analyze, correct, eliminate, or work around errors or defects, delayed or lost revenue, delay in the development or release of new products, features, or functionalities, an increase in collection cycles for accounts receivable, damage to our brand and reputation, negative publicity, loss of channel partners, customers and sales, increased costs to remedy any problem, increased insurance expense, and costlylitigation.
While we maintain insurance, our insurance may be insufficient to cover all liabilities incurred in relation to actual, perceived or purported security breaches or other security incidents. We also cannot be certain that our insurance coverage will be adequate for liabilities actually incurred, that insurance will continue to be available to us on economically reasonable terms, or at all, or that any insurer will not deny coverage as to any future claim. The successful assertion of one or more large claimsagainst us that exceed available insurance coverage, or the occurrence of changes in our insurance policies, including premium increases or the imposition of large deductible or co-insurance requirements, could have a material adverse effect on our business, including our financial condition, operating results and reputation.
In addition, if a high-profile security breach or incident occurs with respect to another security, networking, or analytics provider, our customers and potential customers may lose trust in the value of security, networking, and analytics solutions generally, including our platform and products, which could adversely impact our ability to retain existing customers or attract new ones, potentially causing a negative impact on our business. Any of these negative outcomes could adversely impact market acceptance of our platform and products and could adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
The actual or perceived failure of our platform and products to block malware or prevent a security breach or incident could harm our reputation and adversely impact our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Our platform and products may fail to detect or prevent security breaches or incidents for any number of reasons. Our platform is complex and may contain performance issues that are not detected until after its deployment. We also provide frequent product, feature, and functionality updates and enhancements, which increases the possibility of errors, and our reporting, tracking, monitoring and quality assurance procedures may not be sufficient to ensure we detect any such defects in a timely manner. We have in the past identified, and may in the future identify, vulnerabilities in our platform and products, including due to reporting from bounty hunting programs. Even once identified, addressing vulnerabilities may require customers to take action to reconfigure their systems or our product implementation to resolve such vulnerabilities, and customers' failure to timely take such actions may result in the perceived failure of our platform and products to perform satisfactorily. The performance of our platform can be negatively impacted by our failure to enhance, expand or update our platform, bugs, errors or defects in our software, improper classification of websites by our vendors who provide us with lists of malicious websites, improper deployment or configuration of our platform and products and many other factors.
In addition, the techniques used by cyber threat actors, including state sponsored actors, to access or sabotage networks and other systems change frequently and generally are not recognized until launched against a target. There is a risk that our platform and products are unable to detect or prevent cyber threats until after our customers are impacted. The growth in state sponsored cyber activity showcases the increasing sophistication of cyber threats and dramatically expands the global threat landscape. Moreover, as
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our platform and products are adopted by an increasing number of enterprises, it is possible that the individuals and organizations behind cyber threats will focus on finding ways to defeat our platform and products or to target our systems. If this happens, our platform and products could be targeted by attacks designed to defeat our platform and products, disrupt our business, or create the perception that our platform and products is not capable of providing superior security, any of which could have a serious impact on our reputation as a provider of security, networking, and analytics. Further, high profile security breaches or incidents, whether actual, perceived, or purported, and in particular those of security, networking, or analytics providers, may cause our customers and potential customers to lose trust in security, networking, and analytics solutions generally, and with respect to security in particular, which could materially and adversely impact our ability to retain existing customers or attract new customers.
Increasingly, enterprises are subject to a wide variety of attacks on their networks and systems, including traditional threat actors, malicious code (such as viruses and worms), social engineering attacks (such as deep fakes), targeted phishing attacks, distributed denial-of-service attacks, advanced attacks conducted or sponsored by nation-states or affiliated actors, advanced persistentthreat intrusions, ransomware and other malware and theft or misuse of intellectual property or business or personal data, including by disgruntled employees, former employees or contractors. No security solution, including our platform and products, can address all possible attacks or other security threats, which are becoming increasingly frequent and sophisticated with the development of AI and ML, or block all methods of penetrating a network or otherwise perpetrating a security breach or incident. Our customers typically rely on complex network and security infrastructures, which include products and services from multiple vendors, to secure their networks. If any of our customers becomes infected with malware or experiences a security breach or incident, or if this is perceived or purported to have occurred, such customer could be disappointed with our platform and products, regardless of whether our platform and products are intended to block the attack or other means of perpetrating the incident or would have done so if our platform was configured properly. Additionally, if any enterprise known to use our platform and products is the subject of an actual, perceived or purportedcyberattack or security breach or incident that becomes publicized, our current or potential customers may look to our competitors for alternatives to our platform and products.
The limitation of liability provisions in our standard terms and conditions of sale may not fully or effectively protect us from any or all claims under or as a result of federal, state, or local laws or ordinances, unfavorable judicial decisions in the United States or other countries, or otherwise. In addition, even claims that ultimately are unsuccessful could result in our expenditure of funds in litigation, divert management's time and other resources, and harm our reputation.
From time to time, industry or financial analysts and research firms test our products against other security products. Our platform and products may fail to detect or prevent threats in any particular test for a number of reasons, including misconfiguration. To the extent potential customers, industry or financial analysts or testing firms believe that the occurrence of a failure to detect or prevent any particular threat is a flaw or indicates that our platform and products do not provide significant value, our reputation and business could be materially harmed.
Any actual or perceived flaws in our platform or any actual, perceived or purported security breaches or other security incidents impacting our customers could result in:
a loss of existing or potential customers or channel partners;
delayed or lost sales and harm to our financial condition and results of operations;
a delay in attaining, or the failure to attain, market acceptance;
the expenditure of significant financial resources in efforts to analyze, correct, eliminate, remediate or work around errors or defects, to address and eliminate vulnerabilities and to address any applicable legal or contractual obligations relating to any actual, perceived or purported security breach or incident;
negative publicity and damage to our reputation and brand; and
legal claims and demands (including for stolen assets or information, repair of system damages, and compensation to customers and business partners), litigation, regulatory inquiries or investigations and other liability.
Any of the above results could materially and adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Additionally, with data security being a critical competitive factor in our industry, we make public statements in our policies, on our website, and elsewhere describing the security or performance of our platform and products. As a result, we may face claims, including claims of unfair or deceptive trade practices alleging these statements are not accurate, brought by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, state, local or foreign regulators and private litigants.
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Further, our platform and products may be used by customers or third parties that obtain access to or influence the uses of our products in ways viewed as objectionable or that could violate local law or regulation. For example, some jurisdictions impose content moderation requirements on the internet, and operation of our platform and products in such jurisdictions may require us to comply with or facilitate such content moderation or censorship. In other jurisdictions such as certain European nations, the use of certain of our product features to monitor user activities is prohibited by applicable data privacy regulations. The use of our platform and products to facilitate such activities could result in negative press coverage and negatively affect our reputation.
Interruptions, outages, or other disruptions affecting the delivery or use of our platform and products, or any of the third-party cloud-based systems that we use in our operations, may adversely affect our business, operating results, and financial condition.
Our continued growth depends in part on the ability of our existing customers and new customers to consistently access our platform and products at any time and within an acceptable amount of time. Any interruption or delay in the delivery of our platform and products will negatively impact our customers. One function of our platform and products is to enable secure connections to cloud-based applications and other destinations via the internet. Our customers depend on the continuous availability of our platform and products to access the internet, and our platform and products are designed to operate without interruption in accordance with our service level commitments. However, our platform and products are complex and may contain defects or errors that are not detected until after deployment. Further, some of our software and features are powered by ML and AI, which depend on datasets and algorithms that could be flawed, including through inaccurate, insufficient, outdated, or biased data. In addition, our ability to access certain third-party cloud or SaaS solutions, including those of our service providers and of our customers, is important to our operations and the delivery of our customer support and professional services. If we fail to timely detect defects or errors affecting deployment or use, or if our entire platform or individual products were to fail, customers and users could lose access to critical services and applications until such disruption is resolved or customers deploy disaster recovery measures to bypass our platform and products to access the internet. The adverse effects of any service interruptions on our reputation and financial condition may be disproportionately heightened due to the nature of our business and the fact that our customers expect continuous and uninterrupted service and have a low tolerance for interruptions of any duration. While we do not consider them to have been material, we have experienced, and may in the future experience, service disruptions and other performance problems due to a variety of factors.
The following factors, many of which are beyond our control, can affect the delivery and availability of our platform and products:
the development and maintenance of the infrastructure of the internet;
the performance and availability of third-party telecommunications services with the necessary speed, data capacity and security for providing reliable internet access and services;
decisions by the owners and operators of the data centers where our NewEdge global private cloud network ("NewEdge network") infrastructure is deployed or by global telecommunications service provider partners who provide us with network bandwidth to terminate our contracts, discontinue services to us, shut down operations or facilities, increase prices, change service levels, limit bandwidth, declare bankruptcy or prioritize the traffic of other parties;
the occurrence of earthquakes, floods, fires, pandemics, power loss, system failures, physical or electronic break-ins, acts of war, international conflicts (such as the current conflicts between Russia and Ukraine and in the Middle East) or terrorism, human error or interference (including by disgruntled employees, former employees or contractors) and other catastrophic events;
cyber attacks, including denial of service attacks, targeted at, directed toward, or otherwise impacting us, our data centers, our global telecommunications service provider partners or the infrastructure of the internet;
government action to limit access to the internet or telecommunications services;
failure by us to maintain and update our cloud infrastructure to meet our traffic capacity requirements;
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errors, defects or performance problems in our software, including those potentially introduced by our software updates and third-party software incorporated in our software, which we use to operate our platform;
improper classification of Internet Protocol ("IP") addresses used to provide our platform and products as malicious sites by customers or third-party reputation services which result in access to or by our platform and products being restricted;
improper classification of websites by our vendors who provide us with lists of malicious websites;
improper deployment or configuration of our platform and products by us, our channel partners, or our customers;
the failure of our redundancy systems, in the event of a service disruption at one of our data centers, to provide failover to other data centers in our data center network; and
the failure of our disaster recovery and business continuity arrangements.
The occurrence of any of these factors, or if we are unable to efficiently and cost-effectively fix such errors or other problems that may be identified, could damage our reputation, negatively impact our relationship with our customers or otherwise materially harm our business, results of operations and financial condition.
In addition, we provide our platform and products through a cloud-based inline proxy, and some governments, third-party products, websites or services may block proxy-based traffic under certain circumstances. For example, vendors may attempt to block traffic from our platform and products or blacklist our IP addresses because they cannot identify the source of the proxy-based traffic. Our competitors may use this as an excuse to block traffic from their solutions or blacklist our IP addresses, which may result in our customers' traffic being blocked from our platform and products. If our customers experience significant instances of traffic blockages, they will experience reduced functionality or other inefficiencies, which would reduce customer satisfaction with our platform and products and likelihood of renewal.
We have experienced, and may in the future experience, service disruptions, outages, and other performance problems both in the delivery of our platform and products and in third-party SaaS solutions we use due to a variety of factors, including infrastructure changes, malicious actors, human or software errors, or capacity constraints. In some instances, we may not be able to identify the cause or causes of these performance problems within an acceptable period of time. If our platform and products or the third-party SaaS solutions we depend on are unavailable or if our customers are unable to access our platform and products within a reasonable amount of time or at all, our business would be negatively affected.
We host our platform and products primarily using our own dedicated private cloud infrastructure known as the NewEdge network. Although we have disaster recovery plans that utilize multiple locations, any incident affecting our infrastructure that may be caused by fire, flood, severe storm, earthquake, or other natural disasters, cyber attacks, terrorist, military or other attacks, public health issues, or other similar events could negatively affect our platform and products. A service disruption affecting our platform and products for any of the foregoing or other reasons would negatively impact our ability to serve our customers and could damage our reputation with current and potential customers, expose us to liability, cause us to lose customers, or otherwise harm our business. We may also incur significant costs for using alternative equipment or taking other actions in preparation for, or in reaction to, events that damage the NewEdge network, which would also likely require significant investments of time.
We also rely on third-party software to provide many essential financial and operational services to support our business. Some of these vendors are less established and have shorter operating histories than traditional software vendors. Moreover, many of these vendors provide their services to us via a cloud-based model instead of software that is installed on our premises. As a result, we depend upon these vendors to provide us with services that are always available and are free of errors or defects that could cause disruptions in our business processes. Interruptions, outages, or other disruptions affecting third-party SaaS solutions that we rely on can significantly impact our business, operating results, and financial condition. Such disruptions could cause operational delays, inefficiencies, and customer dissatisfaction, which could result in increased customer churn, revenue loss, and increased mitigation costs and potential penalties for not meeting service-level agreements. Frequent or significant disruptions could damage our reputation, making it harder to attract and retain customers. Additionally, service disruptions can result in non-compliance with regulatory requirements, which could lead to legal penalties and increased scrutiny.
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Incorrect or improper implementation or use of our platform and products could result in customer dissatisfaction and harm our business, financial condition, and results of operations.
Our platform and products are deployed in a wide variety of IT infrastructures, including large-scale, complex technology environments, and we believe our future success will depend, at least in part, on our ability to support such deployments. Implementations of our platform and products may be technically complicated, and it may not be easy to maximize the value of our platform and products without proper implementation, training, and support. Some of our customers have experienced difficulties implementing our platform and products in the past and may experience implementation difficulties in the future. If we, our channel partners or our customers do not implement our platform and products successfully, customer perceptions of our platform and products may be impaired, our reputation and brand may suffer, or customers may choose not to renew their contracts or purchase additional products from us.
Any failure by customers to appropriately implement our platform and products could result in customer dissatisfaction, impact the perceived reliability of our platform and products, result in negative press coverage, negatively affect our reputation, and harm our business, financial condition, and results of operations.
If our platform and products do not interoperate with our customers' systems and security infrastructure or with third-party products, websites or services, our platform and products may become less competitive, and our results of operations may be harmed.
Our platform and products must interoperate with our customers' existing and planned systems and security infrastructure. These complex systems are developed, delivered and maintained by the customer and a myriad of vendors and service providers. As a result, the components of our customers' infrastructure have different specifications, rapidly evolve, utilize multiple protocol standards, include multiple versions and generations of products and may be highly customized. We must be able to interoperate and provide our platform and products to customers with highly complex and customized systems, which requires careful planning and execution between our customers, our customer support teams and our channel partners. Further, when new or updated elements of our customers' infrastructure or new industry standards, regulations, or protocols are introduced, we may have to update or enhance our platform and products to allow us to continue to serve customers. Our competitors or other vendors may refuse to work with us to allow their products to interoperate with our platform and products, which could make it difficult for our platform and products to function properly in customer networks that include these third-party products.
We may not deliver or maintain interoperability quickly or cost-effectively, or at all. These efforts require significant capital investment and engineering resources. If we fail to maintain compatibility of our platform and products with our customers' network, security, and analytics infrastructures, our customers may not be able to fully utilize our platform and products, and we may, among other consequences, lose or fail to increase our market share and experience reduced demand for our platform and products, which would materially harm our business, operating results and financial condition.
We use third-party licensed software and cloud services in or with our platform and products, and the inability to maintain these licenses or issues with the software we license or services we leverage could result in increased costs or reduced service levels, which would adversely affect our business.
Our platform and products include software or other intellectual property licensed from certain third parties, and we use certain software and other intellectual property licensed from third parties in our business. We anticipate that we will continue to rely on such third-party software and intellectual property in the future, and from time to time, we may be required to renegotiate our current third-party licenses or license additional technology from third parties to develop new products, features, and functionality, enhancements thereto, or to facilitate new business models. This exposes us to risks over which we may have little or no control. For example, the third-party software we currently license may not always be available, or available on commercially reasonable terms, and we may not have access to alternative third-party software in the event of any issues with such software. When our licenses for such software expire, our costs may increase or we may not be able to maintain or renew such licenses on commercially reasonable terms. In addition, a third party may assert that we or our customers are in breach of the terms of applicable licenses, which could, among other things, force us to cease use of such software and give such third party the right to terminate the applicable license or seek damages from us, or both. Additionally, we may not have the right to control the maintenance, prosecution, preparation, filing, enforcement, defense, or litigation of intellectual property that we license from third parties and are reliant on our licensors to do so. We also cannot
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be certain that activities such as intellectual property protection, maintenance, prosecution, and enforcement by our licensors have been or will be conducted consistent with our best interests or in compliance with applicable laws and regulations or will result in valid and enforceable intellectual property rights. It is possible that our licensors' infringement proceedings or defense activities may be less vigorous than had we conducted them ourselves or may not be conducted in accordance with our best interests. Furthermore, we cannot be certain that our licensors are not infringing, misappropriating, or otherwise violating the intellectual property rights of third parties or that our licensors have sufficient rights to the licensed intellectual property in all jurisdictions in which we may offer our platform and products. Our inability to obtain or maintain certain licenses or other rights, to obtain or maintain such licenses or rights on favorable terms, or the need to engage in litigation or any other proceedings regarding these matters could result in delays in releases of new products, features, or functionalities and could otherwise disrupt our business, until equivalent technology can be identified, licensed, or developed, if at all. Also, to the extent that our platform and products depend upon the successful operation of third-party software in conjunction with our software, any undetectederrors, vulnerabilities, compromises, or defects in such third-party software could prevent the deployment or impair the functionality of our platform and products, delay introduction of new products, features, or functionalities, result in a failure of our platform or products, and injure our reputation. Any of the foregoing could materially adversely affect our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Claims by others that we infringe their proprietary technology or other rights, or other lawsuits asserted against us, could result in significant costs and substantially harm our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
A number of companies in our industry hold a large number of patents and also protect their copyright, trade secret and other intellectual property rights, and companies in the networking and security industry frequently enter into litigation based on allegations of patent infringement or other violations of intellectual property rights. In addition, patent holding companies seek to monetize patents they previously developed, have purchased or otherwise obtained. Many companies, including our competitors, may now, and in the future, have significantly larger and more mature patent, copyright, trademark and trade secret portfolios than we have, which they may use to assert claims of infringement, misappropriation and other violations of intellectual property rights against us and which may lead to litigation. For example, in 2022, we filed in the Northern District of California for declaratory judgement in response to communications by Fortinet alleging that we have been infringing certain of their patents, which proceedings and related litigation remain ongoing. In addition, intellectual property litigation may involve non-practicing entities or other patent owners who have no relevant product offerings or revenue and against whom our own patents may therefore provide little or no deterrence or protection. As we face increasing competition and gain an increasingly higher profile the possibility of intellectual property rights claimsagainst us grows. Claims asserting that we are infringing third parties' intellectual property, even if without merit, could harm our business, including by increasing our costs, reducing our revenue, creating customer concerns that result in delayed or reduced sales, distracting our management from the running of our business and requiring us to cease use of important intellectual property. In addition, because patent applications can take years to issue and are often afforded confidentiality for some period of time, there may currently be pending applications, unknown to us, that later result in issued patents that could cover one or more of our products. Moreover, in a patent infringement claim against us, we may assert, as a defense, that we do not infringe the relevant patent claims, that the patent is invalid or both. The strength of our defenses will depend on the patents asserted, the interpretation of these patents, and our ability to invalidate the asserted patents. However, we could be unsuccessful in advancing non-infringement and/or invalidityarguments in our defense. In the United States, issued patents enjoy a presumption of validity, and the party challenging the validity of a patent claim must present clear and convincing evidence of invalidity, which is a high burden of proof. Conversely, the patent owner need only prove infringement by a preponderance of the evidence, which is a lower burden of proof. Furthermore, because of the substantial amount of discovery required in connection with patent and other intellectual property rights litigation, there is a risk that some of our confidential information could be compromised by the discovery process.
As the number of products and competitors in our market increases and overlaps occur, claims of infringement, misappropriation and other violations of intellectual property rights may increase. Our insurance may not cover intellectual property rights infringementclaims. Third parties have in the past and may in the future also assert infringementclaimsagainst our customers or channel partners, with whom our agreements may obligate us to indemnify against these claims. In addition, to the extent we hire personnel from competitors, we may be subject to allegations that such employees have divulged proprietary or other confidential information to us.
From time to time, the U.S. Supreme Court, other U.S. federal courts and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Appeals Board, and their foreign counterparts, have made and may continue to make changes to the interpretation of patent laws in their respective jurisdictions. We cannot predict future changes to the interpretation of existing patent laws or whether U.S. or foreign legislative
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bodies will amend such laws in the future. Any changes may lead to uncertainties or increased costs and risks surrounding the outcome of third-party infringementclaims brought against us and the actual or enhanceddamages, including treble damages, that may be awarded in connection with any such current or future claims and could have a material adverse effect on our business and financial condition.
We are unable to predict the likelihood of success in defendingagainst current or future infringementclaims. In the event that we fail to successfullydefend ourselves against an infringement claim, a successful claimant could secure a judgment or otherwise require payment of legal fees, settlement payments, ongoing royalties or other costs or damages; or we may agree to a settlement that prevents us from offering certain products, features, or functionalities; or we may be required to obtain a license, which may not be available on reasonable terms, or at all, to use the relevant technology. If we are prevented from using certain technology or intellectual property, we may be required to develop alternative, non-infringing technology, which could require significant time, during which we could be unable to continue to offer our affected products, features, or functionalities, effort and expense and may ultimately not be successful. Any of these outcomes could result in a material adverse effect on our business. Even if we were to prevail, third-party infringement lawsuits could be costly and time-consuming, divert the attention of our management and key personnel from our business operations, deter channel partners from selling or licensing our platform and products and dissuade potential customers from purchasing our platform and products, which would also materially harm our business. In addition, any public announcements of the results of any proceedings in third-party infringement lawsuits could be negatively perceived by industry or financial analysts and investors and could cause our stock price to experience volatility or decline. Further, the expense of litigation and the timing of this expense from period to period are difficult to estimate, subject to change and could adversely affect our results of operations.
Any of these events could materially and adverselyharm our business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Some of our technology incorporates "open source" software, and we license some of our software through open source projects, which could negatively affect our ability to sell our platform and subject us to possible litigation.
Some aspects of our platform and products are built using open source software, and we intend to continue to use open source software in the future. From time to time, we contribute software source code to open source projects under open source licenses or release internal software projects under open source software licenses and anticipate doing so in the future. Open source software is generally freely accessible, usable, and modifiable. However, certain open source licenses may, in certain circumstances, require us to offer our products that incorporate the open source software for no cost, make available source code for modifications or derivative works we create based upon the open source software, incorporate or use the open source software, and/or license such modifications or derivative works under the terms of the particular open source license or otherwise unfavorable terms. The terms of certain open source licenses to which we are subject have not been interpreted by U.S. or foreign courts, and there is a risk that open source software licenses could be construed in a manner that imposes unanticipated conditions or restrictions on our ability to monetize our platform and products. While we try to insulate our proprietary code from the effects of such open source license provisions, we cannot guarantee that we will be successful, that all open source software is reviewed prior to use in our platform and products, that our developers have not incorporated open source software into our platform and products in potentially disruptive ways, or that they will not do so in the future. Additionally, we may from time to time face claims from third parties claiming ownership of, or demanding release of, the open source software or derivative works that we developed using such software, which could include our proprietary source code, or otherwise seeking to enforce the terms of the applicable open source software license. These claims could result in costlylitigation and could require us to make our software source code freely available, purchase a costly license, or cease offering the implicated products unless and until we can re-engineer them to avoid infringement or violation. This re-engineering process could require significant additional research and development resources, and we may not be able to complete it successfully. We could also be subject to suits by parties claiming ownership of what we believe to be open source software. In addition to risks related to license requirements, use of certain open source software can lead to greater risks than use of third-party commercial software, as open source licensors generally do not provide warranties or controls on the origin of software and, thus, may contain security vulnerabilities or broken code. Moreover, some open source projects have known security and other vulnerabilities and architectural instabilities, or are otherwise subject to security attacks due to their wide availability, and are provided on an "as-is" basis. There is typically no support available for open source software, and we cannot ensure that the authors of such open source software will implement or push updates to address security risks or will not abandon further development and maintenance. Further, our use of any AI tools that use, incorporate, or output any open source software may heighten the foregoing risks. Any of these risks could be difficult to eliminate or manage, and if not addressed, could have a negative effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition.
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Indemnity provisions in various agreements potentially expose us to substantial liability for intellectual property infringement and other losses.
Our agreements with certain of our customers or other third parties may include indemnification or other provisions under which we agree to indemnify or otherwise be liable to them for lossessuffered or incurred as a result of claims of intellectual property infringement, damages caused by us to property or persons, or other liabilities relating to or arising from the use of our platform or other acts or omissions. The term of these contractual provisions often survives termination or expiration of the applicable agreement. We have in the past been sued on the basis of allegedviolation of patents, and as we continue to grow, the possibility of these and other intellectual property rights claimsagainst us may increase. For any intellectual property rights indemnification claim against us or our customers, we may incur significant legal expenses and must pay damages, pay license fees and/or stop using technology found to be in violation of the third party's rights. Large indemnity payments could harm our business, results of operations, and financial condition. We may also have to seek a license for the disputed technology. Such license may not be available on reasonable terms, if at all, and may significantly increase our operating expenses or may require us to restrict our business activities and limit our ability to deliver certain products. As a result, we may also be required to develop alternative non-infringing technology, which could require significant effort and expense and/or cause us to alter our platform, which could negatively affect our business.
From time to time, customers, particularly larger enterprises, require us to indemnify or otherwise be liable to them for breach of confidentiality, violation of applicable law, or failure to implement adequate security measures with respect to their data stored, transmitted, or accessed using our platform. Our customer agreements provide limited indemnification to our customers based on third-party claims related to our violation of intellectual property rights, and some of our customer agreements offer indemnification for claims beyond that scope. The existence of such a dispute may have adverse effects on our customer relationship and reputation and we may still incur substantial liability related to them.
Any assertions by a third party, whether or not successful, with respect to such indemnification obligations could subject us to costly and time-consuming litigation, expensive remediation and licenses, divert management attention and financial resources, harm our relationship with that customer and other current and prospective customers, reduce demand for our platform and products, and harm our brand, business, results of operations, and financial condition.
Risks Related to Laws and Regulations
If we are not able to satisfy data protection, security, privacy and other government- and industry-specific requirements or regulations, our business, results of operations and financial condition could be harmed.
The regulatory frameworks for privacy, data protection, data processing, data sovereignty and security matters are rapidly evolving and are likely to remain volatile for the foreseeable future. Our handling of personal data is subject to various laws and regulations addressing privacy, data protection, cybersecurity, information security, location of data and other regulations or requirements where we offer our platform and products around the world. We also may be or become subject to codes of conduct, rules or other actual or asserted obligations relating to privacy, data protection, data location, cybersecurity, information security, data processing or other matters, including such obligations promulgated or otherwise adopted by industry or other self-regulatory bodies or other cybersecurity or information security or data protection-related organizations. Further, we may be bound by additional, more stringent contractual obligations and other actual and asserted obligations, such as industry standards, relating to our collection, use, disclosure, storage, and other processing of personal and other information. We have numerous customers that operate in highly-regulated industries in which our customers' data is considered particularly sensitive, such as financial services and healthcare, and contracts with customers in these industries may require that we comply with the regulatory standards governing such customers' businesses. For example, in Europe, the Digital Operational Resilience Act (“DORA”), which aims to ensure the resilience of EU financial entities, including through mandatory risk management, incident reporting, resilience testing and third-party outsourcing restrictions, went into effect in 2025 and imposes additional requirements on certain service providers to such entities. Changes in laws or regulations that adversely affect the use of the internet, including laws impacting net neutrality, could also impact our business. For example, the availability of our platform and products in certain jurisdictions has in the past been temporarily disrupted due to government actions requiring us to implement certain content moderation standards applicable under local law.
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The U.S. federal government, and various state and foreign governments, have adopted or proposed laws and regulations on the collection, use, storage, disclosure, and other processing of information relating to individuals. Such laws and regulations may, among other things, require companies to implement privacy and security policies, permit customers to access, correct and delete information stored or maintained by such companies, inform individuals of security breaches that affect their information and, in some cases, obtain individuals' consent to use information for certain purposes. For example, the California Consumer Privacy Act took effect in January 2020 and was subsequently modified by the California Privacy Rights Act, which took effect in January 2023. Numerous other states have enacted, and others are expected to enact, privacy laws that have gone into effect, or will go into effect through 2026, and a federal privacy law is being considered. In addition, in certain jurisdictions, regulatory requirements may be more stringent than those in the U.S. For example, the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation provides for substantial obligations relating to the handling, storage and other processing of information relating to individuals and fines of up to €20 million or 4% of the annual global revenue of the noncompliant company, whichever is greater. The UK’s data protection regime (the UK GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018) also imposes similar obligations relating to the processing of information and penalties of up to the greater of £17.5 million or 4% of global revenue.
We may also have certain obligations under the European Union’s Data Act (the “Data Act”), which took effect on September 12, 2025, and imposes certain service interoperability and switching obligations to enable users to switch between certain cloud service providers without unduedelay or cost, as well as certain requirements concerning international transfers of, and governmental access to, non-personal data located in the European Economic Area. The Data Act may require us to adjust contract terms with customers, and may impact the duration of customer relationships, which could affect our business.
Additionally, Europe’s Network and Information System Directive (“NIS2”) and its implementing laws regulate cybersecurity risk-management and incident response capabilities of entities operating in a number of sectors. Non-compliance with NIS2 may lead to administrative fines of up to €10 million or up to 2% of the total worldwide revenue of the preceding fiscal year. The UK’s Network and Information Systems Regulations 2018 (“UK NIS”) similarly regulate cybersecurity risk-management and incident response capabilities of entities operating in a number of sectors in the UK and non-compliance with UK NIS may lead to fines of up to £17 million. Complying with NIS2, UK NIS,DORA, or other EU or UK cybersecurity laws, directives, and regulations may cause us to incur operational costs or require us to modify our data handling practices on an ongoing basis.
The number of emerging and existing data protection, privacy, sovereignty, and security laws and regulations creates the risk that obligations may be interpreted inconsistently between jurisdictions which may generate tension with our efforts to align our practices to comply with our privacy, data protection, data processing, and security obligations globally. Many of these laws and regulations impose substantial penalties for noncompliance.
We expect that there will continue to be new proposed laws, regulations and industry standards concerning privacy, data protection, cybersecurity, information security, data processing, data sovereignty, and telecommunications services in jurisdictions in which we operate or may operate, and we cannot yet determine the impact such future laws, regulations and standards may have on our business.
Additionally, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a rule entitled the Preventing Access to U.S. Sensitive Personal Data and Government-Related Data by Countries of Concern or Covered Persons, which places additional restriction on certain data transactions involving countries of concern (e.g., China, Russia, and Iran) and covered individuals (i.e., individuals and entities located in or controlled by individuals or entities located in those jurisdictions) that may impact certain business activities such as vendor engagements, sharing of data, employment of certain individuals, and investor agreements. Violations of the rule could lead to significant civil and criminalfines and penalties.
Needing to address new and evolving laws, regulations, standards and other obligations, and changes in the interpretation of existing laws, regulations, standards and other obligations, relating to privacy, data protection, data processing or security could require us to modify our platform and products, restrict our business operations, increase our costs and impair our ability to maintain and grow our customer base and increase our revenue. New and evolving requirements may increase compliance costs, lead to increased regulatory scrutiny or liability, may require additional contractual negotiations, and may adversely impact our business, results of operations, and financial condition. In view of the foregoing, we cannot assure our compliance with all such laws, regulations, standards and obligations. Any failure or perceived failure by us to comply with applicable laws, regulations, standards or actual or asserted obligations, or any actual, perceived or purported security breach or other security incident, whether or not resulting in unauthorized access to, or acquisition, release or transfer of information relating to individuals or other data, may result in regulatory investigations, enforcement actions and other proceedings, private claims, demands, and litigation, fines and penalties or
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adverse publicity, and could cause our customers and prospective customers to lose trust in us, which could have an adverse effect on our reputation and business.
We may also from time to time be subject to obligations relating to data processing by contract, or become, or face assertions that we are, subject to self-regulatory obligations, industry standards, or other obligations relating to privacy, data protection, data processing, cybersecurity and information security. Additionally, the Federal Trade Commission and many state attorneys general have brought enforcement actions in connection with federal and state consumer protection laws for false or deceptive acts or practices in relation to the collection, use, dissemination, and security of information relating to individuals. Internationally, data localization laws may mandate that personal data collected in a foreign country be processed and stored within that country.
We and our customers may face risk of enforcement actions or other proceedings by data protection authorities or other regulatory authorities, private claims, demands, and litigation, fines, penalties, and other potential liabilities, and adverse publicity including reputational damage and loss of customer confidence for actual or allegedviolations of any of the foregoing obligations. Any such claims could result in substantial costs, ongoing remedial, audit and reporting obligations, and diversion of resources, and distract management and technical personnel. These potential proceedings, liabilities, and other matters could also have an overall negative effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition. The amount and scope of insurance we maintain may not cover all types of claims that may arise or otherwise compensate us for all related losses.
New legislation affecting the scope of information regulated by laws, regulations or other actual or asserted obligations where we or our customers and partners have operations, especially relating to classification of Internet Protocol addresses, machine identification, AI and ML, location data, and other information, may limit or inhibit our ability to operate or expand our business, including limiting strategic partnerships that may involve the sharing or other uses or processing of data. We may be required to engage in significant expenditures and efforts in our attempts to comply with current and evolving laws, regulations, and other actual and asserted obligations relating to privacy, data protection, cybersecurity, data sovereignty, and information security. Notably, public perception of potential privacy, data protection, or information security concerns—whether or not valid—may harm our reputation and inhibit adoption of our platform and products and subscriptions by current and future customers. Each of these laws and regulations, and any changes to these laws and regulations, or new laws and regulations, could impose significant limitations, or require changes to our business model or practices or growth strategy, which may increase our compliance expenses and make our business more costly or less efficient to conduct.
Regulatory and legislative developments related to the use of AI and ML could adversely affect our use of such technologies in our platform and products and our business.
We use AI and ML throughout our business. As the regulatory framework for AI, ML, and automated decision making evolves, our business, financial condition, and results of operations may be adversely affected. The regulatory framework for AI, ML, and similar technologies and automated decision making is changing rapidly. It is possible that new laws and regulations will be adopted in the United States and in non-U.S. jurisdictions or that existing laws and regulations may be interpreted in ways that would affect the operation of our platform and products and the way in which we use AI, ML, and similar technologies. We may not be able to adequately anticipate or respond to these evolving laws and regulations, and we may need to expend additional resources to adjust our platform and products in certain jurisdictions if applicable legal frameworks are inconsistent across jurisdictions. In addition, because these technologies are themselves highly complex and rapidly developing, it is not possible to predict all of the legal or regulatory risks that may arise relating to our use of such technologies. Further, the cost to comply with such laws or regulations could be significant and could increase our operating expenses, which would adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.
For example, in August 2024, the EU Artificial Intelligence Act (the "AI Act"), which establishes broad obligations for the development and use of AI-based technologies in the EU based on their potential risks and level of impact, came into force. This framework categorizes AI systems, based on the risks associated with such AI systems' intended purposes, as creating unacceptable or high risks, with all other AI systems being considered low risk. Furthermore, the AI Act includes requirements around transparency, conformity assessments and monitoring, risk assessments, human oversight, security, accuracy, general purpose AI, and foundation models, and provides for fines of up to the greater of €35 million or 7% of worldwide annual turnover for violations. There is a risk that our current or future AI-powered solutions may obligate us to comply with the applicable requirements of the AI Act, which may impose additional costs on us, increase our risk of liability, or adversely affect our business. For example, the AI Act prohibits certain uses of AI systems and places numerous obligations on providers and deployers of permitted AI systems, with heightened
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requirements based on AI systems that are considered high risk. This regulatory framework is expected to have a material impact on the way AI is regulated in the EU and beyond, and, together with developing regulatory guidance and judicial decisions in this area, may affect our use of AI and our ability to provide and to improve our platform and products, require additional compliance measures and changes to our operations and processes, result in increased compliance costs and potential increases in civil claimsagainst us, and could adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.
We will face risks associated with the potential growth of our business within certain heavily regulated industry verticals.
We market and sell our platform and products to customers in heavily regulated industry verticals, including the financial services and healthcare industries. As a result, we face additional regulatory scrutiny, risks, and burdens from the governmental entities and agencies that regulate those industries. Entering new heavily regulated verticals and expanding in those verticals in which we are already operating will continue to require significant resources to address potential regulatory scrutiny, risks, and burdens, and there is no guarantee that such efforts will be successful or beneficial to us. Additionally, our customers have in the past faced, and may in the future face, evolving industry standards and regulations, including relating to cloud security and AI, which require us to update or enhance our platform and products to allow us to continue to serve such customers. If we are unable to successfully penetrate these verticals, maintain our market share in such verticals in which we already operate or cost-effectively comply with governmental and regulatory requirements applicable to our activities with customers in such verticals, our business, financial condition, and results of operations may be harmed.
We are subject to anti-corruption, anti-bribery and similar laws, and noncompliance with such laws can subject us to criminalpenalties or significant fines and harm our business and reputation.
We are subject to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977, the U.K. Bribery Act 2010 and other anti-corruption, anti-bribery, anti-money laundering and similar laws in the United States and other countries in which we conduct activities. Anti-corruption and anti-bribery laws, which have been enforced aggressively and are interpreted broadly, prohibit companies and their employees and agents from promising, authorizing, making or offering improper payments or other benefits to government officials and others in the private sector. We leverage third parties, including channel partners, to sell subscriptions to our platform and conduct our business abroad. We and these third-party intermediaries may have direct or indirect interactions with officials and employees of government agencies or state-owned or affiliated entities and we may be held liable for the corrupt or other illegal activities of these third-party business partners and intermediaries, our employees, representatives, contractors, channel partners and agents, even if we do not explicitly authorize such activities. While we have policies and procedures to address compliance with such laws, we cannot assure you that all of our employees and agents will not take actions in violation of our policies and applicable law, for which we may be ultimately held responsible. As we increase our international sales and business, our risks under these laws may increase. Noncompliance with these laws could subject us to investigations, severecriminal or civil sanctions, settlements, prosecution, loss of export privileges, suspension or debarment from U.S. government contracts, other enforcement actions, disgorgement of profits, significant fines, damages, other civil and criminalpenalties or injunctions, whistleblower complaints, adverse media coverage and other consequences. Any investigations, actions or sanctions could materially harm our reputation, business, results of operations and financial condition.
We are subject to governmental export and import controls and trade and economic sanctions that could impair our ability to compete in international markets and subject us to liability if we are not in full compliance with applicable laws.
Our business activities are subject to various restrictions under U.S. export and similar laws and regulations, including the U.S. Department of Commerce's Export Administration Regulations and various economic and trade sanctions regulations administered by the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control. The U.S. export controls and trade and economic sanctions include restrictions or prohibitions on the sale or supply of certain products and services to U.S. embargoed or sanctioned countries and governments of these countries, as well as other persons and entities. For example, the U.S. and other countries have implemented economic and other sanctions, as well as increased export controls in response to the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine. These export controls and sanctions and any additional restrictions may impact our ability to continue to operate in Russia and other affected regions. In addition, various countries regulate the import of certain technology and have enacted or could enact laws that could limit our ability to provide our platform and products or could limit our customers' ability to access or use our platform and products in those countries.
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Although we take precautions to prevent our platform and products from being provided in violation of such laws, our platform and products may have been in the past, and could in the future be, provided inadvertently in violation of such laws, despite the precautions we take. If we fail to comply with these laws and regulations, we and certain of our employees could be subject to civil or criminalpenalties, including the possible loss of export privileges and fines. We may also be materially and adversely affected through penalties, reputational harm, loss of access to certain markets, or otherwise. Obtaining the necessary authorizations, including any required licenses, for a particular transaction may be time-consuming, is not guaranteed and may result in the delay or loss of sales opportunities. In addition, changes in our platform, or changes in export, sanctions and import laws and regulations, could delay the introduction and sale of subscriptions to our platform in international markets, prevent users in certain countries from accessing our platform and products or, in some cases, prevent the provision of our platform and products to certain countries, governments, persons or entities altogether. Any change in export or import regulations, economic sanctions or related laws, shift in the enforcement or scope of existing regulations or change in the countries, governments, persons or technologies targeted by such regulations could decrease our ability to sell subscriptions to our platform or provide software to existing customers or potential new customers with international operations. Any decrease in our ability to sell subscriptions to our platform or provide software could materially and adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.
We are subject to the tax laws of various jurisdictions, and we could be obligated to pay additional taxes.
We are subject to federal, state, and local income taxes in the United States and numerous foreign jurisdictions. Determining our provision for income taxes requires management's judgment, and the ultimate tax outcome may be uncertain. Our corporate structure and associated transfer pricing policies are designed to support our business in international markets, and consider the functions, risks and assets of the various entities involved in the intercompany transactions. In addition, our provision for income taxes is subject to volatility and could be adversely affected by many factors, including, among other things, changes to our corporate structure and associated transfer pricing policies, changes in the timing or amounts of earnings in jurisdictions with differing statutory tax rates, changes in the valuation of deferred tax assets and liabilities, changes in tax rates, new or revised tax laws or interpretations of existing tax laws and policies, and our ability to operate our business in a manner consistent with our corporate structure and intercompany arrangements. For example, on July 4, 2025, the United States enacted federal tax legislation commonly referred to as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (or “OBBBA”) and made a number of changes to United States federal income tax laws. Among other things, the OBBBA restored deductions for U.S. research and development expenditures (while continuing to require taxpayers to capitalize and amortize foreign research and development expenditures), changed the calculation and deductibility of global intangible low-taxed income (renamed Net CFC Tested Income) and foreign derived intangibles income (renamed Foreign-Derived Deduction Eligible Income) for taxable years beginning after December 31, 2025, and changed the calculation of deductible business interest expense to include depreciation and amortization. The taxing authorities of the jurisdictions in which we operate or regularly target may challenge our methodologies for pricing intercompany transactions pursuant to our intercompany arrangements, disagree with our determinations as to the income and expenses attributable to specific jurisdictions. If such a challenge or disagreement were to occur, and our position was not sustained, or if there are changes in tax laws or the way existing tax laws are interpreted or applied, we could be required to pay additional taxes, interest and penalties. While we regularly assess the adequacy of our provision for income taxes, there can be no assurance that the outcomes of such challenges or disagreements, or the changes in tax laws or their interpretation and application, will not have a material impact on our business, results of operations and financial condition.
Many countries are beginning to implement legislation and other guidance to align their international tax rules with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development's ("OECD") Base Erosion and Profit Shifting recommendations and action plan that aim to standardize and modernize global corporate tax policy, including changes to cross-border tax, transfer pricing documentation rules, and nexus-based tax incentive practices. While the OECD continues discussions surrounding fundamental changes in the allocation of profits among tax jurisdictions in which companies do business, as well as the implementation of a global minimum tax (namely the "Pillar One" and "Pillar Two" proposals), on January 5, 2026, the OECD released administrative guidance that generally excludes U.S. multinational companies from certain minimum tax enforcement measures. We continue to evaluate the impact of these tax developments and those under other OECD and non-U.S. rules as new guidance and regulations are published and become applicable. Changes to these and other areas in relation to international tax reform, including future actions taken by foreign governments could increase uncertainty and may adversely impact our provision for income taxes, net income and cash flows and our operating results in future years.
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Our ability to use our net operating loss carryforwards and certain other tax attributes may be limited.
As of January 31, 2026, we had net operating loss carryforwards for U.S. federal income tax purposes and state income tax purposes of approximately $1.5 billion and $695.9 million, respectively, available to offset future taxable income. Approximately $1.3 billion of our federal net operating loss carryforwards may be carried forward indefinitely, but the deductibility of such carryforwards generally is limited to 80% of our current year taxable income. Beginning in 2026, $603.6 million of state net operating losses will begin to expire at different times. The remaining $92.3 million of state net operating losses will carry forward indefinitely.
As of January 31, 2026, we also had U.S. federal and California research and development and other tax credit carryforwards of $53.6 million and $36.1 million, respectively. If not utilized, the federal research and development tax credit carryforwards will begin expiring at different times beginning in 2032. Our California research and development tax credits may be carried forward indefinitely. Realization of these net operating loss and research and development tax credit carryforwards depends on future income, and there is a risk that a portion of our existing carryforwards could expire unused and be unavailable to offset future income tax liabilities, which could materially and adversely affect our results of operations.
In addition, under Section 382 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the "Code"), if a corporation undergoes an "ownership change," generally defined as a greater than 50% change (by value) in its equity ownership by "5% shareholders" over a three-year period, the corporation's ability to use its pre-change net operating loss carryforwards and other pre-change tax attributes, such as research and development tax credits, to offset its post-change income may be limited. As a result, if we experience one or more ownership changes in the future as a result of subsequent shifts in our stock ownership, our ability to use our pre-change net operating loss carryforwards and other pre-change tax attributes to offset U.S. federal taxable liability may be subject to limitations, which could potentially result in increased future tax liability to us. Furthermore, our state carryforwards may be subject to similar and additional limitations.
Taxing authorities may successfully assert that we should have collected or in the future should collect sales and use, value added or similar taxes, and we could be subject to liability with respect to past or future sales, which could adversely affect our operating results.
We do not collect sales and use, value added or similar taxes in all jurisdictions in which we have sales because we have been advised that such taxes are not applicable to our platform and products in certain jurisdictions. Sales and use, value added and similar tax laws and rates vary greatly by jurisdiction. Certain jurisdictions in which we do not collect such taxes may assert that such taxes are applicable, which could result in tax assessments, penalties and interest, to us or our customers for the past amounts, and we may be required to collect such taxes in the future. If we are unsuccessful in collecting such taxes from our customers, we could be held liable for such costs, which may materially and adversely affect our operating results.
Risks Related to Our Indebtedness
Servicing our substantial indebtedness may require a significant amount of cash, and we may not have sufficient cash flow from our business or the ability to raise funds necessary to satisfy our obligations under our indebtedness. Our debt could also expose us to other risks that could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.
On December 22, 2022, we issued $401.0 million in aggregate principal amount of our 2028 Notes, which, effective upon the completion of the IPO, mature on December 15, 2028. On September 30, 2024, we issued $75.0 million in aggregate principal amount of our 2029 Notes, which mature on August 1, 2029. We may also incur additional indebtedness to meet our future financing needs. We may be required to use a substantial portion of our cash flows from operations to pay interest, principal or other required payments on our indebtedness. The delivery of shares of our Class B common stock upon conversion of the Convertible Notes could result in significant dilution to our existing stockholders and further limit or preclude their ability to influence corporate matters. Based upon the outstanding aggregate principal amount and accrued and unpaid interest on such Convertible Notes as of January 31, 2026 and our initial public offering price of $19.00 per share, the Convertible Notes are convertible into 22,136,005 shares of Class B common stock, which would be approximately 7.8% of the voting power of our capital stock as of such date. Together with our executive officers, directors, and holders of 5% or more of our common stock, this concentrated control could significantly influence corporate matters, including the election of directors, amendments of our organizational documents, and any merger, consolidation, sale of all or substantially all of our assets, or other major corporate transaction requiring stockholder approval. In addition, this may prevent or discourage unsolicited acquisition proposals or offers for our capital stock that Class A common stockholders may feel are in their best
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interest as one group of our stockholders. For a description of the terms of our Convertible Notes, as well as an illustrative calculation of the number of shares of Class B common stock issuable upon conversion of the Convertible Notes as of January 31, 2026 and the maturity date of the Convertible Notes, please see the section titled "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Convertible Notes."
Our ability to make scheduled payments in respect of, to pay interest on, or to refinance our indebtedness, including the Convertible Notes, depends on our future performance, which is subject to economic, financial, competitive and other factors beyond our control. Such payments will reduce the funds available to us for working capital, capital expenditures and other corporate purposes and may limit our ability to obtain additional financing for working capital, capital expenditures, expansion plans and other investments. For example, if we elect in the future to make interest payments in cash rather than payment-in-kind on our Convertible Notes, it may reduce our available cash and adversely impact certain of our financial metrics, including our cash flows from operations, free cash flow, and free cash flow margin. Our business may not be able to generate cash flows from operations in the future that are sufficient to service our debt and make necessary capital expenditures. If we are unable to generate such cash flows, we may be required to adopt one or more alternatives, such as selling assets or obtaining additional debt financing or equity capital on terms that may be onerous or highly dilutive. Our ability to refinance our indebtedness will depend on the capital markets and our financial conditions at such time. We may not be able to engage in any of these activities or engage in these activities on desirable terms, which could result in a default on our debt obligations, which would adversely affect our financial condition. Further, the terms of our Convertible Notes include a number of covenants that limit our ability and our subsidiaries' ability to, among other things, incur additional indebtedness. The terms of our Convertible Notes may restrict our current and future operations and could adversely affect our ability to finance our future operations or capital needs.
In addition, our indebtedness, combined with our other financial obligations and contractual commitments, could have other important consequences. For example, they could:
make us more vulnerable to adverse changes in general U.S. and worldwide economic, industry, and competitive conditions and adverse changes in government regulation;
limit our flexibility in planning for, or reacting to, changes in our business and our industry;
place us at a disadvantage compared to our competitors who have less indebtedness;
limit our ability to borrow additional amounts to fund acquisitions, for working capital and for other general corporate purposes;
subject us to risks associated with variable interest rates to the extent applicable to such indebtedness; and
make an acquisition of our company less attractive or more difficult.
Any of these factors could harm our business, results of operations, and financial condition. In addition, if we incur additional indebtedness, the risks related to our business and our ability to service or repay our indebtedness would increase.
In addition, a failure by us to comply with the covenants or payment requirements specified in our Convertible Notes could result in an event of default under the Convertible Notes, which would give the holders the right to default interest and a right to accelerate payment of the Convertible Notes. If the indebtedness under our Convertible Notes were to be accelerated, we may not have sufficient cash or be able to borrow sufficient funds to refinance the indebtedness or sell sufficient assets to repay the indebtedness, which could immediately adversely affect our business, cash flows, results of operations, and financial condition. Even if we were able to obtain new financing, it may not be on commercially reasonable terms or on terms that are acceptable to us. As of January 31, 2026 and January 31, 2025, the principal and accrued interest of the outstanding Convertible Notes was $528.8 million and $509.9 million in the aggregate, respectively.
We may not have the ability to raise the funds necessary to redeem the Convertible Notes, or to repay the principal and accrued interest of the Convertible Notes in cash at their maturity, and our future debt may contain limitations on our ability to pay cash upon conversion or repurchase of the Convertible Notes.
Holders of the Convertible Notes will have the right to require us to repurchase the Convertible Notes upon the occurrence of certain fundamental changes that may occur before the maturity date, including a change of control. Upon the holders' exercise of such right, we would be required to repurchase the Convertible Notes for a price range, which shall be in an amount equal to the excess of
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(i) 140% of the principal amount of such Convertible Notes on or before the second anniversary of the issue date of the Convertible Notes, (ii) 155% of the principal amount of such Convertible Notes after the second anniversary but on or before the third anniversary of the issue date of the Convertible Notes, or (iii) 170% of the principal amount of such Convertible Notes after the third anniversary of the issue date of the Convertible Notes. We also have the right to redeem the Convertible Notes commencing one year after the date of the IPO if the price of our Class A common stock has increased to over 200% of the then-applicable conversion price for each of at least twenty (20) trading days (whether or not consecutive) during the thirty (30) consecutive trading days prior to providing notice of such redemption. In addition, pursuant to the terms of the Convertible Notes, we will be required to repay the Convertible Notes in cash at their maturity unless earlier converted, redeemed, or repurchased. Moreover, pursuant to the terms of the Convertible Notes, we may, at our option, elect to settle conversions of the Convertible Notes in cash in lieu of issuing shares of our Class B common stock, or a combination of cash and shares of our Class B common stock, with cash in lieu of any fractional shares. However, we may not have enough available cash on hand or be able to obtain financing at the time we are required to make repurchases of any Convertible Notes surrendered therefor or pay cash with respect to Convertible Notes being converted or at their maturity.
In addition, our ability to repurchase the Convertible Notes or to pay cash upon conversion (if we elect to settle such conversions in cash in lieu of issuing shares of our Class B common stock) or at their maturity may be limited by law, regulatory authority, or agreements governing our future indebtedness. Our failure to repurchase Convertible Notes at a time when the repurchase is required by the Convertible Notes or to pay cash upon conversions of the Convertible Notes or at their maturity as required by the applicable indenture governing the Convertible Notes would constitute a default thereunder. A default under the applicable indenture could also lead to a default under agreements governing our future indebtedness. If the payment of the related indebtedness were to be accelerated after any applicable notice or grace periods, we may not have sufficient funds to repay such indebtedness and repurchase the Convertible Notes or pay cash with respect to the conversion of the Convertible Notes (if we elect, at our option, to settle such conversions in cash in lieu of issuing shares of our Class B common stock) or at maturity of the Convertible Notes.
Risks Related to Ownership of Our Class A Common Stock
The market price of our Class A common stock may be volatile, and you could lose all or part of your investment.
The market price of our Class A common stock may fluctuate substantially in response to a number of factors, including those described in this "Risk Factors" section, many of which are beyond our control and may not be related to our operating performance. These fluctuations could cause you to lose all or part of your investment in our Class A common stock. Factors that could cause fluctuations in the market price of our Class A common stock include the following:
actual or anticipated changes or fluctuations in our operating results;
the financial projections we may provide to the public, any changes in these projections or our failure to meet these projections;
announcements by us or our competitors of new products or new or terminated significant contracts, commercial relationships or capital commitments;
industry or financial analyst or investor reaction to our press releases, other public announcements and filings with the SEC;
rumors and market speculation involving us or other companies in our industry;
price and volume fluctuations in the overall stock market from time to time;
volume fluctuations in the trading of our Class A common stock from time to time;
changes in operating performance and stock market valuations of other technology companies generally, or those in our industry in particular;
the sales of shares of our Class A common stock by us or our stockholders;
issuances of shares of our common stock, whether in connection with an acquisition or upon conversion of some or all of our outstanding Convertible Notes;
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failure of industry or financial analysts to maintain coverage of us, changes in financial estimates by any analysts who follow our company, or our failure to meet these estimates or the expectations of investors;
actual or anticipated developments in our business or our competitors' businesses or the competitive landscape generally;
litigation involving us, our industry or both, or investigations by regulators into our operations or those of our competitors;
developments or disputes concerning our intellectual property rights or our platform and products, or third-party proprietary rights;
announced or completed acquisitions of businesses or technologies by us or our competitors;
actual or perceived privacy, data protection, or security incidents or breaches;
new laws or regulations or new interpretations of existing laws or regulations applicable to our business and our responses thereto;
any major changes in our management or our board of directors, particularly with respect to Mr. Beri;
general economic conditions and slow or negative growth of our markets; and
other events or factors, including those resulting from war, incidents of terrorism, global pandemics or responses to these events.
In addition, if the market for technology stocks or the stock market in general experiences a loss of investor confidence, the trading price of our Class A common stock could decline for reasons unrelated to our business, operating results, or financial condition. The trading price of our Class A common stock might also decline in reaction to events that affect other companies in our industry even if these events do not directly affect us. In the past, following periods of volatility in the trading price of a company's securities, securities class action litigation has often been brought against that company. If our stock price is volatile, we may become the target of securities litigation. Securities litigation could result in substantial costs and divert our management's attention and resources from our business. This could have an adverse effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition.
The requirements of being a public company may strain our resources, increase our costs, and distract management, and we may be unable to comply with these requirements in a timely or cost-effective manner.
As a public company, we are subject to the reporting requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the "Exchange Act"), the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (the "Sarbanes-Oxley Act"), the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010, the listing requirements of the Nasdaq Global Select Market ("Nasdaq") and other applicable securities rules and regulations. Compliance with these statutes, regulations, and requirements occupy, and we anticipate will continue to occupy a significant amount of time of our board of directors and management and has significantly increased, and we anticipate will continue to significantly increase our costs and expenses.
In addition, changing laws, regulations, and standards relating to corporate governance and public disclosure are creating uncertainty for public companies, increasing legal and financial compliance costs, and making some activities more time consuming. These laws, regulations, and standards are subject to varying interpretations, in many cases due to their lack of specificity, and, as a result, their application in practice may evolve over time as new guidance is provided by regulatory and governing bodies. This could result in continuing uncertainty regarding compliance matters and higher costs necessitated by ongoing revisions to disclosure and governance practices. We intend to invest substantial resources to comply with evolving laws, regulations, and standards, and this investment may result in increased general and administrative expenses and a diversion of management's time and attention from revenue-generating activities to compliance activities. If our efforts to comply with new laws, regulations, and standards differ from the activities intended by regulatory or governing bodies due to ambiguities related to their application and practice, regulatory authorities may initiate legal proceedings against us, and our business may be adversely affected.
In addition, being a public company subject to these rules and regulations may make it more difficult and more expensive for us to obtain director and officer liability insurance, and we may be required to accept reduced policy limits and coverage or incur substantially higher costs to obtain the same or similar coverage. As a result, it may be more difficult for us to attract and retain qualified individuals to serve on our board of directors or as executive officers. We are currently evaluating these rules, and we cannot predict or estimate the amount of additional costs we may incur or the timing of such costs.
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As a result of disclosure of information in our filings with the SEC, our business and financial condition have become more visible, which we believe may result in threatened or actual litigation, including by competitors and other third parties. If such claims are successful, our business and results of operations could be adversely affected, and even if the claims do not result in litigation or are resolved in our favor, these claims, and the time and resources necessary to resolve them, could divert the resources of our management and adversely affect our business and results of operations.
Our failure to achieve and maintain an effective system of disclosure controls and internal control over financial reporting could adversely affect our financial position and lower our stock price.
As a public company, we are subject to the reporting requirements of the Exchange Act, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and the applicable listing standards of Nasdaq. The requirements of these rules and regulations have, and we anticipate will continue to, increase our legal, accounting, and financial compliance costs, make some activities more difficult, time-consuming, and costly, and place significant strain on our personnel, systems, and resources. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires, among other things, that we maintain effective disclosure controls and procedures and internal control over financial reporting. In order to maintain and improve the effectiveness of our disclosure controls and procedures and internal control over financial reporting, we have expended, and anticipate that we will continue to expend, significant resources, including accounting-related costs and significant management oversight.
Our internal resources and personnel may in the future be insufficient to avoid accounting errors, and there can be no assurance that we will not have material weaknesses in the future. Any failure to develop or maintain effective controls or any difficulties encountered implementing required new or improved controls could harm our operating results or cause us to fail to meet our reporting obligations and may result in a restatement of our financial statements for prior periods. Any failure to implement and maintain effective internal control over financial reporting also could adversely affect the results of periodic management evaluations and annual independent registered public accounting firm attestation reports regarding the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting that we will eventually be required to include in our periodic reports that will be filed with the SEC.
Ineffective disclosure controls and procedures and internal control over financial reporting could also cause investors to lose confidence in our reported financial and other information, which would likely have a negative effect on the trading price of our Class A common stock. In addition, if we are unable to continue to meet these requirements, we may not be able to remain listed on Nasdaq. We are not currently required to comply with the SEC rules that implement Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and are therefore not required to make a formal assessment of the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting for that purpose. As a public company, we will be required to provide an annual management report on the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting commencing with our second annual report on Form 10-K. This assessment will need to include disclosure of any material weaknesses identified by our management in our internal control over financial reporting. We will also be required to disclose changes made in our internal control and procedures on a quarterly basis. Our independent registered public accounting firm will not be required to report on the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting pursuant to Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act until our second annual report required to be filed with the SEC. At such time, our independent registered public accounting firm may issue a report that is adverse in the event it is not satisfied with the level at which our controls are documented, designed, or operating.
Any failure to maintain effective disclosure controls and internal control over financial reporting could have an adverse effect on our business, results of operations and financial condition, and could cause a decline in the price of our Class A common stock.
Our management team has limited experience managing a public company.
Most members of our management team have limited experience managing a publicly traded company, interacting with public company investors, and complying with the increasingly complex laws pertaining to public companies. Our management team may not successfully or efficiently manage our activities as a public company that are subject to significant regulatory oversight and reporting obligations under the federal securities laws and the continuous scrutiny of securities analysts and investors. These new obligations and constituents will continue to require significant attention from our senior management and could divert their attention away from the day-to-day management of our business, which could harm our business, financial condition, and results of operations.
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Our business could be impacted as a result of actions by activist shareholders or others.
We may be subject, from time to time, to legal and business challenges in the operation of our company due to actions instituted by activist shareholders or others. Responding to such actions could be costly and time-consuming, may not align with our business strategies and could divert the attention of our board of directors and senior management from the pursuit of our business strategies. Perceived uncertainties as to our future direction as a result of shareholder activism may lead to the perception of a change in the direction of the business or other instability and may affect our relationships with our end-customers, prospective and current employees and others.
The multi-class structure of our common stock has the effect of concentrating voting control with the holders of our outstanding Class B common stock. This ownership will limit or preclude your ability to influence corporate matters.
Our Class B common stock has 20 votes per share, our Class A common stock has one vote per share, and our Class C common stock has no voting rights, except as otherwise required by law. As of January 31, 2026, holders of our outstanding Class B common stock held in the aggregate 97.3% of the voting power of our capital stock and will be able to control all matters submitted to our stockholders for approval. Additionally, our executive officers, directors, and holders of 5% or more of our common stock held, in the aggregate, approximately 61.6% of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock as of January 31, 2026. Our Chief Executive Officer and Chairman entered into a voting agreement with one of our non-executive co-founders for 2.1% of the voting power, resulting in an aggregate 11.0% of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock as of January 31, 2026. This concentrated control will limit or preclude the ability of holders of Class A common stock to influence corporate matters for the foreseeable future, including the election of directors, amendments of our organizational documents, and any merger, consolidation, sale of all or substantially all of our assets, or other major corporate transaction requiring stockholder approval. In addition, this may prevent or discourage unsolicited acquisition proposals or offers for our capital stock that Class A common stockholders may feel are in their best interest as one group of our stockholders.
Future transfers by holders of shares of Class B common stock will generally result in those shares converting to Class A common stock, except for certain transfers permitted by our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, including transfers for tax and estate planning purposes so long as the transferring holder of Class B common stock continues to hold exclusive voting and dispositive power with respect to the shares transferred or shares voting and dispositive power with respect to such shares only with certain family members or professional service providers. Further, all shares of Class B common stock will be converted into shares of Class A common stock following the earliest to occur of certain events as described in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation.
In addition, because our Class C common stock carries no voting rights (except as otherwise required by law), if we issue Class C common stock in the future, the holders of Class B common stock may be able to elect all of our directors and to determine the outcome of most matters submitted to a vote of our stockholders for a longer period of time than would be the case if we had issued Class A common stock rather than Class C common stock in such future transactions.
We cannot predict the effect our multi-class structure may have on the trading price of our Class A common stock.
We cannot predict whether our multi-class structure will result in a lower or more volatile trading price of our Class A common stock, adverse publicity, or other adverse consequences. For example, certain index providers have announced restrictions affecting companies with multiple-class share structures in certain of their indices. In July 2017, FTSE Russell announced that it would require new constituents of its indices to have greater than 5% of a company's voting rights in the hands of public stockholders. Under this policy, the multi-class structure of our common stock could make us ineligible for inclusion in certain indices and, as a result, mutual funds, exchange-traded funds, and other investment vehicles that attempt to passively track those indices would not invest in our Class A common stock. Because of the multi-class structure of our common stock, we may be excluded from certain indices, and other stock indices may take similar actions. Given the sustained flow of investment funds into passive strategies that seek to track certain indices, exclusion from certain stock indices could preclude investment by many of these funds and could make our Class A common stock less attractive to other investors. As a result, the trading price of our Class A common stock could be adversely affected.
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If industry or financial analysts do not publish research or issue inaccurate or unfavorable research about us, our business or our market, or if they change their recommendation regarding our Class A common stock adversely, our stock price and trading volume could decline.
The trading market for our Class A common stock is influenced by the research and reports that industry or financial analysts publish about us, our business, our market, or our competitors. We do not control these analysts or the content and opinions included in their reports. If any of the analysts who cover us issues an inaccurate or unfavorable opinion regarding our business or our stock price, our stock price would likely decline. In addition, the stock prices of many companies in the technology industry have declined significantly after those companies have failed to meet, or significantly exceed, the financial guidance publicly announced by the companies or the expectations of analysts. If our financial results fail to meet, or significantly exceed, our announced guidance or the expectations of analysts or public investors, analysts could downgrade our Class A common stock or publish unfavorable research about us. If one or more of these analysts cease coverage of our company or fail to publish reports on us regularly, our visibility in the financial markets could decrease, which in turn could cause our stock price or trading volume to decline.
Sales of substantial amounts of our Class A common stock in the public markets, or the perception that they might occur, could reduce the price that our Class A common stock might otherwise attain and may dilute your voting power and your ownership interest in us.
Sales of a substantial number of shares of our Class A common stock in the public market, particularly sales by our directors, executive officers and significant stockholders, or the perception that these sales could occur, could adversely affect the market price of our Class A common stock and may make it more difficult for you to sell your Class A common stock at a time and price that you deem appropriate.
The Class A common stock issued in the IPO are freely tradable without restriction under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act"), except for any shares of Class A common stock that may be held or acquired by our directors, executive officers and other affiliates (as that term is defined in the Securities Act), which will be restricted securities under the Securities Act.
In connection with the IPO, we and all of our directors and officers and the holders of substantially all of our outstanding Class A common stock and securities convertible into or exercisable or exchangeable (directly or indirectly) for our Class A common stock are entered into lock-up agreements with the underwriters. On March 13, 2026, the lock-up period expired and additional shares of our Class A common stock became available for sale in the public market.
In addition, we have in the past and may in the future use a sell-to-cover settlement method to satisfy tax withholding and remittance obligations associated with the vesting and settlement of RSUs held by our employees, under which shares of our Class A common stock are sold into the market on behalf of our employees to cover the associated tax withholding obligations. Such sales would cause dilution to our stockholders and could increase the volatility of the trading price of our Class A common stock. Because the purpose of the sell-to-cover transactions is to generate proceeds sufficient to satisfy tax withholding obligations, the exact number of shares sold depends on the sale prices of the Class A common stock in such transactions. In addition, the exact number of shares of our Class A common stock eligible for sale in the open market in connection with such tax withholding obligations may differ based on our stockholders' personal tax rates.
We have registered shares of Class A common stock that we may issue under our equity compensation plans. Subject to the satisfaction of applicable exercise or vesting periods, the shares issued upon exercise of outstanding stock options or upon settlement of outstanding RSU awards will be available for immediate resale in the United States in the open market as a result of being issued under such registration statement or pursuant to other securities law exemptions.
We may also issue our shares of Class A common stock or securities convertible into shares of our Class A common stock from time to time in connection with a financing, acquisition, investments or otherwise. Any such issuance could result in substantial dilution to our existing stockholders and cause the market price of our Class A common stock to decline.
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We may need additional capital, and we cannot be certain that additional financing will be available on favorable terms, or at all.
Historically, we have financed our operations primarily through the sale of our debt, equity-linked and equity securities as well as payments received from customers. We expect that the IPO proceeds, together with our existing cash, cash equivalents, short-term investments and anticipated payments from customers will be sufficient to meet our anticipated cash needs for working capital, capital expenditures and Convertible Notes repayment requirements for at least the next 12 months. We may need to raise additional funds to fund our operating expenses, make capital purchases, acquire or invest in business or technology, and we may not be able to obtain those funds on favorable terms, or at all. If we raise additional equity or equity-linked financing, our stockholders may experience significant dilution of their ownership interests and the per share value of our Class A common stock could decline. Furthermore, if we engage in additional debt financing, the holders of our debt would have priority over the holders of our Class A common stock, and we may be required to accept terms that restrict our ability to incur additional indebtedness or our ability to pay any dividends on our Class A common stock, though we do not intend to pay dividends in the foreseeable future. We may also be required to take other actions, any of which could harm our business and operating results. If we need to access the capital markets, there can be no assurance that financing may be available on attractive terms, if at all. If we are unable to obtain adequate financing on terms satisfactory to us, when we require it, our ability to continue to support our business growth and to respond to business challenges could be significantly limited, and our business, operating results, financial condition and prospects could be materially and adversely affected.
We are an "emerging growth company" and we cannot be certain if the reduced disclosure requirements applicable to emerging growth companies will make our Class A common stock less attractive to investors.
We are an "emerging growth company," as defined in the JOBS Act, and have the option to use certain exemptions from various reporting requirements that are applicable to other public companies that are not emerging growth companies including, but not limited to, not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404, reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation in our periodic reports and proxy statements, and exemptions from the requirements of holding a nonbinding advisory vote on executive compensation and stockholder approval of any golden parachute payments not previously approved. We may take advantage of these reporting exemptions until we are no longer an emerging growth company. We will remain an emerging growth company until the earlier of (i) the last day of the fiscal year (A) following the fifth anniversary of the IPO, (B) in which we have total annual revenue of at least $1.235 billion, or (C) in which we are deemed to be a large accelerated filer, with at least $700 million of equity securities held by non-affiliates as of the prior June 30th, and (ii) the date on which we have issued more than $1 billion in non-convertible debt during the prior three-year period.
Under the JOBS Act, emerging growth companies can also delay adopting new or revised accounting standards until such time as those standards apply to private companies. We have elected to use this extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards that have different effective dates for public and private companies until the earlier of the date we (i) are no longer an emerging growth company or (ii) affirmatively and irrevocably opt out of the extended transition period provided in the JOBS Act. As a result, our financial statements may not be comparable to companies that comply with new or revised accounting pronouncements as of public company effective dates. Further, we may take advantage of some of the other reduced regulatory and reporting requirements that will be available to us so long as we qualify as an "emerging growth company."
Among other things, this means that our independent registered public accounting firm will not be required to provide an attestation report on the effectiveness of our internal controls over financial reporting so long as we qualify as an emerging growth company, which may increase the risk that weaknesses or deficiencies in our internal controls over financial reporting go undetected. Likewise, so long as we qualify as an emerging growth company, we may elect not to provide you with certain information, including certain financial information and certain information regarding compensation of our executive officers, that we would otherwise have been required to provide in filings we make with the SEC, which may make it more difficult for investors and securities analysts to evaluate our company. As a result, investor confidence in our company and the market price of our Class A common stock may be adversely affected. Further, we cannot predict if investors will find our Class A common stock less attractive because we will rely on these exemptions. If some investors find our Class A common stock less attractive as a result, there may be a less active trading market for our Class A common stock and our stock price may be more volatile.
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We do not intend to pay dividends in the foreseeable future. As a result, your ability to achieve a return on your investment will depend on appreciation in the price of our Class A common stock.
We have never declared or paid any cash dividends on our common stock. We currently intend to retain all available funds and any future earnings for use in the operation of our business and do not anticipate paying any dividends on our Class A common stock in the foreseeable future. Any determination to pay dividends in the future will be at the discretion of our board of directors. Accordingly, investors must rely on sales of their Class A common stock after price appreciation, which may never occur, as the only way to realize any future gains on their investments.
Delaware law and provisions in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws could make a merger, tender offer or proxy contest difficult, thereby depressing the market price of our Class A common stock.
Our status as a Delaware corporation and the anti-takeover provisions of the Delaware General Corporation Law (the "DGCL") may discourage, delay, or prevent a change in control by prohibiting us from engaging in certain business combinations with an interested stockholder for a period of three years after the date of the transaction in which the person became an interested stockholder, even if a change of control would be beneficial to our existing stockholders. In addition, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws contain a number of provisions that may make the acquisition of our company more difficult. Such provisions include:
a multi-class common stock structure, which provides our pre-IPO stockholders, including certain of our executive officers, employees, directors, and their affiliates, with significant influence over matters requiring stockholder approval, including the election of directors and significant corporate transactions, such as a merger or other sale of our company or its assets;
requiring approval of the holders of at least two-thirds of the outstanding shares of our Class B common stock for certain corporate actions including (i) any amendment to the amended and restated certificate of incorporation that alters the voting, conversion or other rights, powers, preferences, or restrictions of the Class B common stock, (ii) reclassification of Class A common stock or Class C common stock into shares having rights as to dividends or liquidation that are senior to the Class B common stock, (iii) an increase to the voting power of the Class A common stock or Class C common stock, and (iv) issuance of shares of any class or series of capital stock (other than Class B common stock) having more than one vote per share;
authorizing only our board of directors to fill vacant directorships, and the number of directors constituting our board of directors will be permitted to be set only by a resolution adopted by a majority of the authorized number of directors;
a classified board of directors, consisting of three classes of directors with staggered three-year terms who are only able to be removed from office for cause;
authorizing stockholder action only at an annual or special meeting of stockholders, and providing that a special meeting of our stockholders may only be called by a majority of the authorized number of directors, the chair of our board of directors, our chief executive officer, or our president;
requiring advance notice procedures for stockholders to nominate candidates for election as directors or to bring matters before an annual meeting of stockholders;
not providing for cumulative voting;
authorizing undesignated preferred stock, the terms of which may be established and shares of which may be issued without further action by our stockholders, except that the approval of holders of two-thirds of the outstanding shares of our Class B common stock voting as a separate series will be required to authorize, or issue, any shares (other than Class B common stock) having the right to more than one vote per share;
providing that certain litigationagainst us can only be brought in Delaware; and
requiring the approval of the holders of at least two-thirds of the voting power of our then-outstanding capital stock to amend the foregoing provisions of our certificate of incorporation or amend any provision of our bylaws.
These provisions, alone or together, could discourage, delay or prevent a transaction involving a change in control of our company. These provisions could also discourage proxy contests and make it more difficult for stockholders to elect directors of their
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choosing and to cause us to take other corporate actions they desire, any of which, under certain circumstances, could limit the opportunity for our stockholders to receive a premium for their shares of our Class A common stock, and could also affect the price that some investors are willing to pay for our Class A common stock.
Our amended and restated bylaws generally provide that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware (or another state court in Delaware) and the federal district courts of the United States are the exclusive forums for substantially all disputes between us and our stockholders, which could limit our stockholders' ability to obtain a favorable judicial forum for disputes with us or our directors, officers, stockholders or employees.
Our amended and restated bylaws provide that, unless we consent in writing to the selection of an alternative forum, the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware (or, if the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware does not have jurisdiction, another state court in Delaware or the federal district court for the District of Delaware) is, to the fullest extent permitted by law, the sole and exclusive forum for the following types of proceedings:
any derivative action or proceeding brought on behalf of us;
any action asserting a claim of breach of a fiduciary duty owed by any of our directors, officers, stockholders, or other employees to us or our stockholders;
any action asserting a claim arising pursuant to any provision of the DGCL or our amended and restated certificate of incorporation or our amended and restated bylaws (as either may be amended from time to time); or
any action asserting a claim governed by the internal affairs doctrine.
Nothing in our amended and restated bylaws precludes stockholders that assert claims under the Exchange Act from bringing such claims in federal court, subject to applicable law. Our amended and restated bylaws further provide that, unless we consent in writing to the selection of an alternative forum, the federal district courts of the United States are the exclusive forum for resolving any complaint asserting a cause of action arising under the Securities Act or the rules and regulations thereunder.
Although we believe these provisions benefit us by providing increased consistency in the application of Delaware law for the specified types of actions and proceedings, these exclusive-forum provisions may make it more expensive for stockholders to bring a claim than if the stockholders were permitted to select another jurisdiction and may limit a stockholder's ability to bring a claim in a judicial forum that it finds favorable for disputes with us or our directors, officers, stockholders, or other employees, which may discourage lawsuits against us and our directors, officers, stockholders, and other employees. Our amended and restated bylaws also limit the ability of a person to bring a claim in a judicial forum that it finds favorable for disputes arising under the Securities Act against any person in connection with any offering of the Company's securities, including any auditor, underwriter, expert, control person, or other defendant. Any person or entity purchasing, holding, or otherwise acquiring any interest in any of our securities shall be deemed to have notice of and consented to these provisions. The enforceability of similar choice of forum provisions in other companies' governing documents has been challenged in legal proceedings, and it is possible that a court could find these types of provisions to be inapplicable or unenforceable. We also note that stockholders cannot waive compliance (or consent to noncompliance) with the federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder. If a court were to find either exclusive-forum provision in our amended and restated bylaws to be inapplicable or unenforceable in an action, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving the dispute in other jurisdictions, which could significantly harm our business.
We may issue preferred stock whose terms could adversely affect the voting power or value of our Class A common stock.
Our certificate of incorporation authorizes us to issue, without the approval of our stockholders (except that the approval of holders of two-thirds of the outstanding shares of our Class B common stock voting as a separate series will be required to authorize, or issue, any shares (other than Class B common stock) having the right to more than one vote per share), one or more classes or series of preferred stock having such designations, preferences, limitations, and relative rights, including preferences over our Class A common stock respecting dividends and distributions, as our board of directors may determine. The terms of one or more classes or series of preferred stock could adversely impact the voting power or value of our Class A common stock. For example, we might grant holders of preferred stock the right to elect some number of our directors in all events or on the happening of specified events or the right to veto specified transactions. Similarly, the repurchase or redemption rights or liquidation preferences we might assign to holders of preferred stock could affect the residual value of our Class A common stock.
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General Risk Factors
We may become involved in litigation that may materially and adversely affect us.
From time to time, we may become, involved in various legal proceedings relating to matters incidental to the ordinary course of our business, including patent, commercial, product liability, employment, class action, whistleblower and other litigation and claims, and governmental and other regulatory investigations and proceedings. For example, we have in the past been sued on the basis of allegedviolation of patents, and as we continue to grow, the possibility of these and other intellectual property rights claimsagainst us may increase. Such matters can be time-consuming, divert management's attention and resources, cause us to incur significant expenses or liability and/or require us to change our business practices. In addition, the expense of litigation and the timing of this expense from period-to-period are difficult to estimate, subject to change and could adversely affect our results of operations. Because of the potential risks, expenses and uncertainties of litigation, we may, from time to time, settle disputes, even where we have meritoriousclaims or defenses, by agreeing to settlement agreements. Because litigation is inherently unpredictable, we cannot assure you that the results of any of these actions will not have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations, financial condition, and future prospects.
Our business is subject to the risks of earthquakes, fire, floods and other natural catastrophic events, and to interruption by man-made problems such as power disruptions, computer viruses, acts of war, international conflicts, terrorism, and security breaches or incidents.
Our business operations have been, and could in the future be, subject to disruption by natural disasters such as earthquakes, fire, floods or public health emergencies such as an outbreak of a pandemic or epidemic disease, as well as man-made problems such acts of war, international conflicts such as the current conflicts between Russia and Ukraine and in the Middle East, terrorism and other geopolitical unrest, or fear of such events. Such events could also cause disruptions in the businesses of our partners, customers or suppliers, national economies, or the world economy as a whole. In addition, computer malware, viruses and computer hacking, fraudulent use attempts and phishing attacks have become more prevalent in our industry, and may become more frequent and effective through the use of AI, and our internal systems may be victimized by such attacks. Although we maintain incident management and disaster response plans, in the event of a major disruption caused by a natural disaster or man-made problem, we may be unable to continue our operations and may endure system interruptions, reputational harm, delays in our development activities, lengthy interruptions in service, security breaches and incidents and loss of critical data. Our insurance may not be sufficient to cover losses or additional expense that we may sustain in the event of a natural disaster or man-made problem. Though it is difficult to determine what, if any, harm may directly result from any specific interruption or attack, any failure to maintain performance, reliability, security and availability of our platform to the satisfaction of our users may materially harm our reputation and our ability to retain existing customers and attract new customers.
It em 1B. Unresolved Staff Comments.
None.
Item 1C. Cybersecurity.
Cybersecurity Risk Management
We maintain a cybersecurity risk management program designed to mitigate risks from cybersecurity threats to our business, products, systems, and data, including risks associated with third-party service providers. Our cybersecurity program provides a foundation for identifying, monitoring, evaluating, and responding to cybersecurity threats and incidents, including those associated with our use of software, applications, services, and cloud infrastructure developed or provided by third-party vendors and service providers. This program includes steps for identifying the source of a cybersecurity threat or incident, including whether such cybersecurity threat or incident is associated with a third-party vendor or service provider: assessing the severity and overall risk of a cybersecurity threat or incident, implementing cybersecurity countermeasures and mitigation or remediation strategies, and informing the relevant members of our senior management team and, when appropriate, the Audit Committee and our Board of Directors.
We engage third parties, including vendors and other external service providers , to support our cybersecurity and data privacy processes. For example, we regularly engage independent third parties for penetration testing and evaluation of our various security
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compliance standards. We also conduct internal assessments of our cybersecurity risk management program. We periodically review and update our cybersecurity policies, standards and procedures, including to account for material changes in the threat and operational landscapes, as well as in response to legal and regulatory developments. Our team has established a continuous improvement process through which we regularly update our risk register against the evolving capabilities of adversaries and incorporate findings from internal and external testing. Further, we require mandatory training for all employees and contractors on our cybersecurity and privacy policies. We also have processes to oversee and identify risks from cybersecurity threats associated with our use of third-party service providers. We maintain a comprehensive, risk-based approach to identifying and overseeing cybersecurity risks presented by third parties, including vendors, service providers and other external users of our systems, as well as the systems of third parties that co uld adversely impact our business in the event of a cybersecurity incident affecting those third-party systems. In addition, we perform diligence on our vendors and prospective vendors regarding their cybersecurity posture.
An incident response team is responsible for the monitoring and disposition of potential occurrences such as data breaches, intrusions, and other security incidents and implementing our detailed incident response plan. Our incident response plan includes processes and procedures for assessing potential internal and external threats, activation and notification, and post-incident recovery designed to safeguard the confidentiality, availability, and integrity of our information assets.
In fiscal 2026, and through the filing of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, cybersecurity threats, including as a result of any previous cybersecurity incidents, have not materially affected our business strategy , operating results, and/or financial condition. If we were to experience a material cybersecurity incident in the future, such an incident could potentially have a material effect, including on our business strategy, operating results, or financial condition. For more information regarding cybersecurity risks that we face and potential impacts on our business related thereto, see Part I, Item 1A, “Risk Factors” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
Cybersecurity Governance
Our Board of Directors oversees our overall enterprise risk management. Our cybersecurity risk management program is integrated with our overall enterprise risk management and is prioritized for Board oversight through the Audit Committee. The Audit Committee receives periodic updates from our Chief Information Security Officer ("CISO") regarding cybersecurity risks and the Company’s cybersecurity program, which may include updates on threat environment, security program initiatives, incident response preparedness, and significant risk areas.
Management is responsible for day-to-day risk management activities, including identifying and assessing cybersecurity risks, establishing processes to ensure that potential cybersecurity risk exposures are monitored, implementing appropriate mitigation or remediation measures, and maintaining cybersecurity programs. Our cybersecurity program is led by our CISO, who regularly reports to senior management and provides updates to the Audit Committee. The CISO works directly with the internal security team to support oversight of cybersecurity risks across the Company.
Our CISO has substantial cybersecurity experience, and has held senior leadership positions at publicly traded companies in the technology industry. The CISO’s leadership team, which consists of seasoned information security professionals with experience at globally recognized organizations, works to ensure that we maintain a robust and comprehensive approach to cybersecurity oversight.
It em 2. Properties.
We are headquartered in Santa Clara, California, where we lease approximately 43,000 square feet of office space pursuant to a lease which expires in 2030, with an option to extend for an additional 5-year period up to 2035. We lease additional offices in other locations, including Missouri, the United Kingdom, France, India, Spain, and Taiwan. We also lease space in highly secure colocation facilities for our data centers in over 80 regions across the globe.
We lease all of our facilities and do not own any real property. We believe that our existing facilities are adequate and suitable for our current needs and that, should it be needed, suitable additional or alternative space will be available as and when needed.
Ite m 3. Legal Proceedings.
From time to time, we are involved in various legal proceedings arising from activities in the normal course of business. We are not presently a party to any litigation the outcome of which, we believe, if determined adversely to us, would individually or taken together have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, and cash flows. Defending any legal
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proceedings is costly and can impose a significant burden on management and employees. The results of any current or future litigation cannot be predicted with certainty, and regardless of the outcome, litigation can have an adverse impact on us because of defense and settlement costs, diversion of management resources, and other factors.
It em 4. Mine Safety Disclosures.
Not applicable.
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PART II
It em 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities.
Market Information Common Stock
Our Class A common stock trades on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol “NTSK” since September 18, 2025. Prior to that date, there was no public trading market for our Class A common stock. Our Class B common stock and Class C common stock are not listed nor traded on any stock exchange.
Holders of Record
As of March 24, 2026, we had 95 holders of record of our Class A common stock, 228 holders of record of our Class B common stock, and no holders of record of our Class C common stock. Because many of our shares of Class A common stock are held in street name by brokers, institutions, and other nominees on behalf of stockholders, we are unable to estimate the total number of beneficial owners of our Class A common stock represented by these holders of record.
Dividend Policy
We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our capital stock. We currently intend to retain all available funds and any future earnings for use in the operation and growth of our business and do not anticipate paying any dividends on our capital stock in the foreseeable future. Any future determination to declare dividends will be made at the discretion of our board of directors, subject to applicable laws, and will depend on our financial condition, results of operations, capital requirements, general business conditions, and other factors that our board of directors may deem relevant.
Unregistered Sales of Equity Securities
None.
Purchases of Equity Securities by the Issuer and Affiliated Purchasers
None.
Use of Proceeds from Initial Public Offering of Common Stock
In September, 2025, we completed our IPO, in which we issued and sold 54,970,000 shares of our Class A common stock, at a public offering price of $19.00 per share. We received net proceeds of approximately $992.2 million, after deducting underwriting discounts and commissions of $52.2 million. All shares sold were registered pursuant to a registration statement on Form S-1 (File No. 333-289786), as amended (the “Registration Statement”), declared effective by the SEC on September 17, 2025. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC acted as the representative of the underwriters for the offering. No payments for such expenses were made directly or indirectly to (i) any of our officers or directors or their associates, (ii) any persons owning 10% or more of any class of our equity securities, or (iii) any of our affiliates.
There has been no material change in the planned use of proceeds from our IPO as described in our final prospectus for the IPO dated as of September 17, 2025 and filed with the SEC pursuant to Rule 424(b)(4) on September 18, 2025.
Stock Performance Graph
This performance graph shall not be deemed “soliciting material” or be “filed” with the SEC for purposes of Section 18 of the Exchange Act, or otherwise subject to the liability under that Section, and shall not be deemed to be incorporated by reference into any of our filing Inc. under the Securities Act or Exchange Act generally.
We have presented below the cumulative total return to our holders of our Class A common stock between September 18, 2025 (the date our Class A common stock commenced trading on Nasdaq) through January 31, 2026 in comparison to the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (IGV). All values assume a $100 initial investment and data for
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the Standard & Poor's 500 Index and iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (IGV) assume reinvestment of dividends. The comparisons are based on historical data and are not indicative of, nor intended to forecast, the future performance of our Class A common stock.
Item 6. [Reserved]
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It em 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.
The following discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations should be read in conjunction with the our consolidated financial statements and related notes appearing elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Some of the information contained in this discussion and analysis or set forth elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, particularly information with respect to our future results of operations or financial condition, business strategy and plans, and objectives of management for future operations, and includes forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties as described under the heading “Special Note About Forward-Looking Statements” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. You should review the disclosure under the heading “Risk Factors” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K for a discussion of important factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those anticipated in these forward-looking statements. Our fiscal year ends on January 31, and our fiscal quarters end on April 30, July 31, October 31, and January 31. Our fiscal years ended January 31, 2026, 2025, and 2024 are referred to herein as fiscal 2026, fiscal 2025, and fiscal 2024, respectively.
Unless the context otherwise requires, all reference in this Annual Report on Form 10-K to "we", "us", "our", "our company", and "Netskope" refer to Netskope, Inc. and its subsidiaries. Unless otherwise indicated, references to our "common stock" include our Class A common stock and Class B common stock.
A discussion regarding our financial condition and results of operations for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2026 compared to the fiscal year ended January 31, 2025 is presented below. A discussion regarding our financial condition and results of operations for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2025 compared to the fiscal year ended January 31, 2024 can be found in "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" in the final prospectus for our initial public offering ("IPO") dated as of September 17, 2025 and filed with the SEC pursuant to Rule 424(b)(4) on September 18, 2025 (the "Final Prospectus")
Overview
We are redefining security and networking for the era of cloud and AI.
The cloud and AI have completely revolutionized work. We are more dispersed, more productive, and more automated than ever before, and the rate of change is only accelerating. Not since the internet has there been such a transformative tectonic shift. But, with it has come collateral damage—traditional security and networking are now broken.
We founded Netskope to address this revolution. We built Netskope One, our unified, cloud-native platform from the ground up to solve the challenge of securing and accelerating the digital interactions of enterprises in this new era. Organizations rely on our Netskope One platform to provide profound contextual intelligence into their data and digital interactions, securing them with precision, without sacrificing the digital experience. We leverage our patented technologies to enable dynamic, granular context-aware policies that allow us to protect sensitive data, stop threats, support regulatory compliance, and elevate the digital experience.
Organizations today operate in a digital landscape that is heterogeneous and highly connected. It is comprised of globally dispersed users and non-human entities such as devices, applications, automated systems, and AI agents that interact with each other and a plethora of managed and unmanaged Software-as-a-Service applications, websites, AI, private applications, and other ecosystem applications across data centers and private and public clouds. With this new digital landscape, enterprises need a security and networking platform that can handle these far more complex, distributed, and dynamic sets of connections—all with more advanced security measures—to keep the organization, its people, and its data safe.
Legacy appliance-based and first-generation cloud security solutions were designed for a legacy internet and data footprint, where simple rules-based threat detection and block-or-allow policies were sufficient. Moreover, traditional corporate networks were not designed to support the scale, flexibility, performance, and advanced security that is essential in the cloud and AI era.
Architecture is critical when addressing these challenges. Our Netskope One platform uses a unique architecture built from the ground up as a unified platform with a converged security, network, and analytics technology stack that runs on our NewEdge global private cloud network ("NewEdge network") to deliver highly secure and performant digital interactions.
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Recent Developments
In September 2025, we completed our IPO, in which we issued and sold an aggregate 54,970,000 shares of our Class A common stock at a public offering price of $19.00 per share, including 7,170,000 shares pursuant to the exercise of the option granted to the underwriters to purchase additional shares. We received net proceeds of approximately $992.2 million after deducting underwriting discounts and commissions of $52.2 million.
In addition, in connection with the IPO, all outstanding shares of convertible preferred stock were automatically converted into 218,897,608 shares of Class B common stock.
During the third quarter of fiscal 2026, we recognized a total of $415.8 million in stock-based compensation expense and related payroll taxes, of which $402.1 million was stock-based compensation expense associated with Restricted Stock Units ("RSUs"), including $56.7 million associated with Performance-based Stock Units ("PSUs"), resulting from the satisfaction of the liquidity-based vesting condition upon the effective date of the Registration Statement filed in connection with our IPO. To meet the related tax withholding obligation for the RSUs settled during the third quarter of fiscal 2026, we withheld 5,960,339 shares out of the 14,009,204 shares of Class B common stock issuable to the holders of such vested RSUs, and paid the withholding taxes based on the IPO price per share for the total shares withheld.
Key Factors Affecting Our Performance
Pace of Modernization of Security and Networking for Organizations. The rapid evolution of enterprise IT is driving organizations to replace legacy systems with cloud-based and hybrid solutions, fundamentally altering the way security and networking solutions are deployed and operated. We believe that as enterprises undergo digital transformation, they increasingly rely on advanced technologies such as AI to gain granular visibility and control over information flows. This trend is compounded by the growing imperative to understand and secure data in an environment where hybrid and remote work models are common. Moreover, organizations' expanding global operations and the relentless push for improved user experience has driven the convergence of security and networking that is reshaping industry standards. While we are in the early stages of this transformation, we believe that the pace of modernization will continue to accelerate, reinforcing the demand for our platform.
Our Ability to Add New Customers. Our ability to grow our customer base is a key indicator of both our market penetration and the future opportunities available to us.
Our Ability to Retain and Expand Within Our Existing Customers. We believe that our ability to retain and expand within our existing customers is a testament to the technological strength and extensibility of our Netskope One platform and our customer relationships. As our customers realize tangible value from the products that they deploy, they often purchase more subscriptions, increase the number of users in more departments and geographies, and extend the number of applications covered.
Investments in Sales and Marketing. We plan to continue investing in the expansion of our salesforce and channel partners to pursue attractive growth opportunities both domestically and internationally. In the Americas (which we define as the United States, Canada, and Latin America), this includes continuing the growth of our sales team, selling into the U.S. federal government market now that we have achieved U.S. Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program ("FedRAMP") High Authorization, and growing our channel partners, including managed service providers ("MSPs"), to expand within the mid-market.
Investment in Innovation. We plan to continue investing in research and development to drive rapid innovation, leveraging our core platform to serve our customers' needs and further strengthen our technology leadership. We believe this will lead to continued increased customer acquisition, expansion, and retention. We also intend to continue evaluating strategic acquisitions and investments in businesses and technologies that enhance our product capabilities, allow us to enter adjacent markets, and accelerate time to market.
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Key Business Metric
We monitor the following key metric to help us evaluate our business, measure our performance, identify trends affecting our business, formulate business plans, and make strategic decisions.
Dollar-Based Net Retention Rate ("NRR")
Our ability to maintain long-term revenue growth and achieveprofitability is dependent on our ability to retain and grow revenue generated from our existing customers. We believe that we will achieve this objective by continuing to focus on customer success and loyalty and by continuously innovating our platform. Our NRR may fluctuate from period to period as we continue to expand our business.
As of January 31,
Dollar-based net retention rate (1)
(1) Our NRR reflects the percentage of our annual recurring revenue ("ARR") from existing customers, inclusive of the effects of upsell, cross-sell, contraction, and churn. We calculate this by first determining the ARR of the cohort of customers established on the same date of the prior fiscal year (the "Prior Period ARR"). We then calculate the ARR from these same subscription customers as of the current period end (the "Current Period ARR"). Current Period ARR includes any expansion and is net of contraction and churn over the trailing 12 months, but excludes ARR from new customers. We then divide the Current Period ARR by the Prior Period ARR to arrive at our NRR. In addition, We define ARR as the annualized value of our cloud subscription contracts that are active as of the measurement date, assuming any contract that expires during the next 12 months is renewed on its existing terms. Provided that we are actively negotiating a renewal or new agreement with a customer after the expiration of a contract, we continue to include that contract's annualized value in ARR until the customer notifies us of their decision not to renew. ARR excludes non-recurring components of revenue such as professional services, training, sales of hardware, and other non-recurring revenue.
Components of Results of Operations
Revenue
We generate revenue primarily from subscriptions to the more than 25 products within our Netskope One platform, along with related support services. Subscription revenue accounted for approximately 99% of the Company's total revenue in fiscal 2026 and fiscal 2025. Customers do not take possession of cloud-based software; instead, our commitment is to provide our security, networking, and analytics platform throughout the contractual term. As a result, we recognize subscription revenue ratably over the contract term, which typically ranges from one to three years.
Professional services and hardware account for an immaterial portion of our total revenue.
Cost of Revenue
Our cost of revenue consists of direct costs associated with providing our platform and products and our related professional services, including colocation and network transit expenses to operate our global data centers, depreciation of our data center equipment, cloud infrastructure and software expenses, and amortization of capitalized internal-use software. It also includes employee-related compensation expenses, such as salaries, bonuses, stock-based compensation expense, and employee benefits for teams supporting cloud operations and customer support and service organizations, and allocated overhead costs. We continuously work on optimizing these costs through strategic partnerships, improved operational efficiencies, and technological advancements.
Additionally, we have made significant strategic investments to expand the global coverage of our NewEdge network to serve enterprises worldwide, which has historically increased our cost of revenue. As we have built our NewEdge network to include data centers in 80 unique regions with more than 200 localization zones globally, we do not anticipate future expansion requirements at the same rate. We expect the level of investment as a percentage of revenue to decrease over the long term as we realize the benefits of scale and operating leverage from previous investments we have made.
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Gross Profit and Gross Margin
Gross profit is revenue less cost of revenue and gross margin is gross profit expressed as a percentage of revenue. Both gross profit and gross margin have been and will continue to be affected by various factors, including the costs associated with infrastructure and services.
Operating Expenses
Operating expenses consist of sales and marketing, research and development, and general and administrative expenses. Employee-related compensation expenses are the most significant component of operating expenses and consist of salaries, benefits, bonuses, stock-based compensation expense, and in the case of sales and marketing expenses, sales commissions. Operating expenses also include other non-employee costs such as cloud infrastructure expenses, office leases and facilities-related expenses, fees for third-party professional services, and costs associated with software and subscription services.
Sales and Marketing
Sales and marketing expenses consist primarily of employee-related compensation expenses, sales commissions, marketing campaigns, marketing events, brand-building activities, promotions, and travel and entertainment expenses. Our sales and marketing strategies are comprehensive, involving direct sales efforts, channel partnerships, and digital marketing initiatives. We expect to expand our market presence both domestically and internationally, educate potential customers about the benefits of our platform and products, and drive both customer acquisition and retention.
We expect our sales and marketing expenses will increase in dollar amount as we continue to invest meaningfully in expanding our sales force, increasing our marketing efforts, and expanding into new markets, but over the long term, we expect our sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of revenue to decrease.
Research and Development
Research and development expenses consist primarily of employee-related compensation expenses, cloud infrastructure expenses related to the development of our platform and products, consulting fees, and software and subscription services. We prioritize research and development expenses to continuously enhance our product features, security protocols, and user experience, ensuring that we can respond swiftly to new cyber threats and customer needs.
We expect our research and development expenses to increase in dollar amount as we continue to increase investments in our technology architecture and platform. However, we anticipate research and development expenses to decrease as a percentage of our total revenue over the long term although our research and development expenses may fluctuate as a percentage of revenue from period to period depending on the timing of these expenses.
General and Administrative
General and administrative expenses consist primarily of employee-related compensation expenses, and other expenses for our executive, finance, legal, and human resources organizations. General and administrative expenses also include external legal, accounting, consulting, professional services fees, software and subscription services, facilities expenses, and other corporate expenses.
We expect to incur additional expenses as a result of operating as a public company, including costs to comply with the rules and regulations applicable to companies listed on a national securities exchange, costs related to compliance and reporting obligations, and increased expenses for insurance, investor relations, and professional services. As our business expands, we expect our general and administrative expenses will increase in dollar amount to support our growth, but over the long term, we expect our general and administrative expenses as a percentage of revenue to decrease.
Loss on Changes in Fair Value of Convertible Notes
We issued Convertible Notes (as defined below) in December 2022 and September 2024. We have elected to account for the Convertible Notes using the fair value option under Accounting Standards Codification ("ASC") 825, Financial Instruments . As a
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result, we are required to determine the fair value of the Convertible Notes on a quarterly basis using a complex valuation model. If the fair value of the Convertible Notes increases during a given period, we recognize a loss on the change in fair value of Convertible Notes in our statement of operations for that period. Conversely, if the fair value of the Convertible Notes decreases, we recognize a gain on the change in fair value of Convertible Notes in that period.
Other Income, net
Other income, net consists primarily of interest income, amortization of premiums and accretion of discounts on investment, convertible note issuance cost, and gains and losses from foreign currency transactions.
Provision for Income Taxes
Provision for income taxes consists primarily of income taxes in certain foreign jurisdictions in which we conduct business. We maintain a full valuation allowance against net U.S. federal and state deferred tax assets as it is more likely than not that they will not be realized based on our history of losses.
On July 4, 2025, the United States enacted tax reform legislation through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Included in this legislation are provisions that allow for the immediate expensing of domestic U.S. research and development expenses, immediate expensing of certain capital expenditures, and other changes to the U.S. taxation of profits derived from foreign operations. Because we have a valuation allowance on our U.S. deferred tax assets, the tax law did not impact tax expense or cash paid for taxes for fiscal 2026 when the law was enacted.
Results of Operations
The following table sets forth our results of operations for the periods presented:
Year Ended January 31,
(in thousands)
Revenue
Cost of revenue (1)
Gross profit
Operating expenses:
Sales and marketing (1)
Research and development (1)
General and administrative (1)
Total operating expenses
Loss from operations
Loss on changes in fair value of convertible notes
Other income, net
Loss before provision for income taxes
Provision for income taxes
Net loss
(1) Includes stock-based compensation as follows:
Year Ended January 31,
(in thousands)
Cost of revenue
Sales and marketing
Research and development
General and administrative
Total stock-based compensation expense
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The following table sets forth the components of our consolidated statements of operations as a percentage of revenue for each of the periods presented:
Year Ended January 31,
Revenue
Cost of revenue
Gross profit
Operating expenses:
Sales and marketing
Research and development
General and administrative
Total operating expenses
Loss from operations
Loss on changes in fair value of convertible notes
Other income, net
Loss before provision for income taxes
Provision for income taxes
Net loss
Note: Certain figures may not sum up due to rounding.
Comparison of the Fiscal Years Ended January 31, 2026 and 2025
Revenue
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Revenue
Revenue increased by $170.7 million, or 32%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. The increase in revenue was driven by an increase in customers and the growing demand for our products from existing customers. Approximately 29% of the increase was driven by the addition of new customers and approximately 71% of the increase was driven by expansion within our existing customers.
Cost of Revenue, Gross Profit, and Gross Margin
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Cost of revenue
Gross profit
Gross margin
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Cost of revenue increased by $36.0 million, or 19%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. Employee-related compensation expense increased by $36.3 million due to $29.7 million of stock-based compensation expense and related payroll taxes we recognized as the liquidity-based vesting condition for certain stock-based awards was met upon our IPO. In addition, colocation and network transit expenses increased by $8.7 million which was partially offset by a $5.8 million decrease in amortization of intangible assets and a $3.3 million decrease in cloud infrastructure and software expenses.
Gross profit increased by $134.8 million, or 39%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025, and gross margin increased to 68% in fiscal 2026 from 65% in fiscal 2025. The gross margin expansion was primarily due to revenue growth driven by new customer acquisition and expansion within our existing customer base, which outpaced the growth in cost of revenue. The lower relative growth in cost of revenue reflects improved operating efficiencies in the management of our global data centers and cloud infrastructure operations.
Sales and Marketing
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Sales and marketing
Sales and marketing expenses increased by $112.9 million, or 40%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. Employee-related compensation expense increased by $94.5 million due to $70.3 million of stock-based compensation expense and related payroll taxes we recognized as the liquidity-based vesting condition for certain stock-based awards was met upon our IPO. The remaining increase in employee-related compensation expense was primarily driven by growth in headcount. In addition, amortization of capitalized sales commissions and marketing-related expenses increased by $7.8 million and $5.3 million, respectively.
Research and Development
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Research and development
Research and development expenses increased by $254.8 million, or 100%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. Employee-related compensation expense increased by $241.9 million due to $206.0 million of stock-based compensation expense and related payroll taxes we recognized as the liquidity-based vesting condition for certain stock-based awards was met upon our IPO. The remaining increase in employee-related compensation expense was primarily driven by growth in headcount. In addition, outside services increased by $8.4 million.
General and Administrative
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
General and administrative
General and administrative expenses increased by $163.9 million, or 239%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. Employee-related compensation expense increased by $159.9 million due to $154.4 million of stock-based compensation expense and related payroll taxes we recognized as the liquidity-based vesting condition for certain stock-based awards was met upon our IPO. In addition, professional services increased by $5.8 million.
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Loss on Changes in Fair Value of Convertible Notes
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Loss on changes in fair value of convertible notes
Loss on change in fair value of Convertible Notes decreased by $64.4 million, or 65%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. The fair value of our convertible notes increased during the current year; however, the loss recognized in earnings was lower because a larger portion of the total fair value change was attributed to instrument-specific credit risk, which is recorded in other comprehensive income.
Other Income, net
Year Ended January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Other income, net
Other income, net increased by $14.7 million, or 358%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025. The increase was mainly due to a $9.1 million increase in interest income, a $3.7 million increase in foreign currency exchange gain, and a $2.2 million increase in the accretion of discounts on our investments in debt securities.
Provision for Income Taxes
Year Ended
January 31,
Change
(in thousands, except percentages)
Provision for income taxes
Provision for income taxes increased by $7.1 million, or 167%, in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025, primarily due to higher foreign tax liabilities in fiscal 2026 as a result of the expansion of our business internationally. In addition, we recognized a non-recurring tax benefit from the establishment of deferred tax liability as part of the acquisition of Dasera, Inc. in fiscal 2025.
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Non-GAAP Financial Measures
We believe the following non-GAAP measures are useful in evaluating our operating performance. We use the following non-GAAP financial information to evaluate our business, measure our performance, identify trends affecting our business, formulate business plans, and make strategic decisions. We believe that non-GAAP financial information, when taken collectively, may be helpful to investors because it provides consistency and comparability with past financial performance. However, non-GAAP financial information is presented for supplemental information purposes only, has limitations as an analytical tool, and should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for financial information presented in accordance with GAAP. Other companies, including companies in our industry, may calculate similarly titled non-GAAP measures differently or may use other measures to evaluate their performance, all of which could reduce the usefulness of our non-GAAP financial measures as tolls for comparison.
Non-GAAP Gross Profit and Non-GAAP Gross Margin
Non-GAAP gross profit and non-GAAP gross margin are defined as GAAP gross profit and GAAP gross margin, respectively, excluding stock-based compensation and related tax expense and amortization of acquired intangible assets. We believe these non-GAAP measures offer additional consistency and comparability with our historical financial performance, providing management and investors with more meaningful period-to-period comparisons. These metrics are designed to remove the impact of certain variables that can fluctuate for reasons unrelated to our underlying operating performance.
The following table provides a reconciliation of our non-GAAP gross profit to our gross profit and of our non-GAAP gross margin to our gross margin, for each of the periods presented:
Year Ended January 31,
(in thousands, except percentages)
Revenue
Gross profit
Add: Stock-based compensation expense and related taxes
Add: Amortization of acquired intangible assets
Non-GAAP gross profit
Gross margin
Non-GAAP gross margin
We expect non-GAAP gross margin will increase over the long term through improved operational efficiencies, scale benefits, and technological advancements.
Non-GAAP Loss from Operations and Non-GAAP Operating Margin
Non-GAAP loss from operations and non-GAAP operating margin are defined as GAAP loss from operations and GAAP operating margin, respectively, excluding stock-based compensation expense and related taxes, transaction costs related to acquisitions, amortization of acquired intangible assets, and impairment of right-of-use assets. We believe these non-GAAP measures offer our management and investors additional consistency and comparability with our historical financial performance, enabling more meaningful period-to-period comparisons. These metrics are designed to remove the impact of certain variables that can fluctuate for reasons unrelated to our underlying operating performance.
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The following table provides a reconciliation of our non-GAAP loss from operations to our loss from operations and of our non-GAAP operating margin to our operating margin, for each of the periods presented:
Year Ended January 31,
(in thousands, except percentages)
Revenue
Loss from operations
Add: Stock-based compensation expense and related taxes
Add: Acquisition-related expenses
Add: Amortization of acquired intangible assets
Add: Impairment of right-of-use assets
Non-GAAP loss from operations
Operating margin
Non-GAAP operating margin
We expect non-GAAP operating margin to improve over the long term through continued operational efficiencies, scale benefits, and technological advancements.
Free Cash Flow and Free Cash Flow Margin
Free cash flow is defined as net cash used in operating activities less purchases of property and equipment and intangible assets and capitalized internal-use software. Free cash flow margin is determined by dividing free cash flow by revenue. We believe that free cash flow and free cash flow margin serve as valuable indicators of liquidity, providing management and investors with insights into the cash generated from our operations. After accounting for investments in property and equipment, intangible assets, and internal-use software, this cash is available for strategic initiatives, such as investing in our business and strengthening our financial position. Free cash flow does not represent the total change in our cash balance in any given period.
The following table summarizes our cash flows and provides a reconciliation of free cash flow to net cash provided by (used in) operating activities and of our free cash flow margin to our net cash provided by (used in) operating activities as a percentage of revenue for each of the periods presented:
Year Ended January 31,
(in thousands, except percentages)
Net cash provided by (used in) operating activities
Less: Purchase of property and equipment and intangible assets
Less: Capitalization of internal-use software costs
Free cash flow
Net cash provided by (used in) operating activities as a percentage of revenue
Free cash flow margin
We expect free cash flow and free cash flow margin to improve over the long term through continued operational efficiencies, scale benefits, and technological advancements, however, the improvement is not expected to be linear.
Liquidity and Capital Resources
In September 2025, we completed our IPO, whereby we received net proceeds of approximately $992.2 million after deducting underwriting discounts and commissions. As of January 31, 2026, our principal source of liquidity includes cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities aggregating to $1.2 billion.
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Since our inception, we have generated operating losses, as reflected in our accumulated deficit of $2.6 billion as of January 31, 2026. While we have historically incurred annual negative cash flows from operating activities since inception, we generated positive operating cash flow in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025 and in the first, third, and fourth quarters of fiscal 2026. We anticipate continued improvement in our operating cash flow over the long term. Notwithstanding the foregoing, we may still incur operating losses and generate negative cash flows from operations in the future due to the investments we intend to continue to make in our business. As a result, we may require additional capital resources to execute strategic initiatives to grow our business.
We believe that our existing cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities will be sufficient to support our working capital and capital expenditure requirements for at least the next 12 months. Our future capital requirements will depend on many factors, including but not limited to our obligation to repay any balance under our Convertible Notes, our revenue growth rate, timing of cash receipt and payments, and the timing and extent of spending to support strategic initiatives. We may be required to seek additional equity, equity-linked, or debt financing. In the event that we require additional financing, we may not be able to raise such financing on terms acceptable to us or at all. If we are unable to raise additional capital or generate cash flows necessary to expand our operations and invest in continued innovation, we may not be able to compete successfully, which would harm our business, operating results, and financial condition.
Cash Flows
The following table shows a summary of our cash flows for the periods presented:
Year Ended January 31,
(in thousands)
Net cash provided by (used in) operating activities
Net cash (used in) provided by investing activities
Net cash provided by financing activities
Operating Activities
Our primary source of cash provided by operations is revenue. Our primary use of cash in our operating activities include payments for employee-related compensation, contract acquisition costs, outside services, and other corporate expenditures.
Net cash provided by operating activities was $38.1 million for fiscal 2026 as compared to the $110.7 million of net cash used in operating activities for fiscal 2025. The improvement in operating cash flows was primarily driven by a decrease in accounts receivable and increases in accrued compensation and benefits, accounts payable, and accrued expenses and other current liabilities. These were partially offset by higher deferred contract acquisition cost and prepaid expenses and other current assets.
Investing Activities
Our primary use of cash for investing activities include purchases of property and equipment and marketable securities. Our primary source of cash provided by investing activities include sale and maturities of marketable securities.
Net cash used in investing activities was approximately $666.9 million for fiscal 2026 as compared to the $2.2 million of net cash provided by investing activities for fiscal 2025. The change was primarily due to the additional investment in marketable securities and purchases of property and equipment, primarily data center-related equipment. These were partially offset by the increase in sale and maturity of our marketable securities.
Financing Activities
Our primary source of cash provided by financing activities include proceeds from the issuance of common stock and the exercise of stock options. Our primary use of cash for financing activities include payments for stock issuance costs, tax withholding obligations related to the settlement of equity awards, and holdback payment related to business combination.
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Net cash provided by financing activities was $895.4 million for fiscal 2026 as compared to the $109.9 million for fiscal 2025. The increase was primarily driven by the proceeds from our IPO and proceeds from the issuance of our common stock upon the exercise of stock options. These were partially offset by payments for deferred offering costs and tax withholding obligations related to the settlement of equity awards.
Convertible Notes
In December 2022, we issued $401.0 million in aggregate principal amount of our 3.75% Convertible Senior PIK Toggle Notes due 2027 (as amended to extend the maturity date to 2028, the "2028 Notes") pursuant to an indenture, dated as of December 22, 2022, as supplemented by that certain First Supplemental Indenture, dated April 25, 2025, and Second Supplemental Indenture, dated September 19, 2025 (as supplemented, the "2028 Notes Indenture"), between us and U.S. Bank Trust Company, National Association, as trustee (the "Trustee"). In September 2024, we issued $75.0 million in aggregate principal amount of our 3.00% Convertible Senior PIK Toggle Notes due 2029 (the "2029 Notes" and, together with the 2028 Notes, the "Convertible Notes"), pursuant to an indenture, dated as of September 30, 2024, as supplemented by that certain First Supplemental Indenture, dated as of September 19, 2025 (the "2029 Notes Indenture" and, together with the 2028 Notes Indenture, the "Indentures"), between us and the Trustee. The 2028 Notes accrue interest at a rate of 3.75% per annum and pursuant to the terms of the 2028 Notes Indenture, will mature on December 15, 2028 (the "2028 Note Maturity Date"), unless earlier repurchased, redeemed, or converted. The 2029 Notes accrue interest at a rate of 3.00% per annum and will mature on August 1, 2029 (the "2029 Note Maturity Date" and, together with the 2028 Note Maturity Date, each a "Maturity Date"), unless earlier repurchased, redeemed, or converted. Interest on the Convertible Notes is payable quarterly in arrears in cash or by increasing the principal amount thereof, at our election.
Our obligations under the Convertible Notes are guaranteed by each of our subsidiaries other than certain excluded subsidiaries. The Convertible Notes are senior, unsecured obligations and the guarantees are senior, unsecured obligations of our subsidiary guarantors.
The Convertible Notes are convertible at the option of the holders following the date that is nine calendar months after the IPO until the relevant Maturity Date, at a conversion price equal to 42.1046 shares of Class B common stock per $1,000 principal amount of the 2028 Notes (equal to a conversion price of approximately $23.75 per share), or 40.4858 shares of Class B common stock per $1,000 principal amount of 2029 Notes (equal to a conversion price of approximately $24.70 per share). The number of shares of Class B common stock that would be issuable upon conversion of the Convertible Notes are as follows (in thousands, except share amounts):
As of January 31, 2026
As of Maturity Date
Aggregate
Principal and
Accrued and
Unpaid Interest
Shares of Class B
Common Stock
Issuable Upon
Conversion
Aggregate
Principal and
Accrued and
Unpaid Interest
Shares of Class B
Common Stock
Issuable Upon
Conversion
2028 Notes
2029 Notes
Total
Holders of the Convertible Notes are also entitled to convert such Convertible Notes upon certain corporate transactions or if we call Convertible Notes for redemption following a change in tax law.
Pursuant to the terms of the Convertible Notes, we are required to offer to redeem the Convertible Notes upon the occurrence of certain change of control events, our liquidation or dissolution or, the delisting of our Class A common stock. We would be required to repurchase the Convertible Notes at a price equal to the greater of (i) a specified premium, which shall be in an amount equal to the excess of (x) 140% of the principal amount of such Convertible Notes on or before the second anniversary of the issue date of the Convertible Notes, (y) 155% of the principal amount of such Convertible Notes after the second anniversary but on or before the third anniversary of the issue date of the Convertible Notes, or (z) 170% of the principal amount of such Convertible Notes after the third anniversary of the issue date of the Convertible Notes and (ii) the principal amount thereof and all accrued and unpaid interest thereon.
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So long as the holders of the 2028 Notes have made no prior repurchase demand, holders of the 2028 Notes can, during the period beginning 120 days prior to the 2028 Note Maturity Date (or earlier, if we so choose) and ending 91 days prior to the 2028 Note Maturity Date, submit a repurchase demand requiring us to offer to repurchase their 2028 Notes at a repurchase price equal to the principal amount of such 2028 Notes and an amount equal to a rate of return of 14.0% per annum, compounded quarterly. Holders of the 2029 Notes can require us to repurchase their 2029 Notes following the date that is the earlier of (i) September 30, 2028, and (ii) the third anniversary of the IPO, at a repurchase price equal to the principal amount of such 2029 Notes and an amount equal to a rate of return of 13.5% per annum, compounded quarterly.
The table below reflects the maximum amount potentially owed under the Convertible Notes, assuming that the Convertible Notes are held until the Maturity Date.
Rate of Return (1)
Maturity Date
Amount
(dollars in millions)
2028 Notes
December 2028
2029 Notes
August 2029
(1) Compounded quarterly.
On or after the one year anniversary of the completion of the IPO, we may redeem all or any portion of the Convertible Notes for cash at a redemption price equal to 100% of the principal amount thereof, plus accrued and unpaid interest, if the price of our Class B common stock is at least 200% (or in the case of the 2028 Notes, beginning on December 15, 2027, at least 230%) of the then-applicable conversion price for each of at least twenty (20) trading days (whether or not consecutive) during the thirty (30) consecutive trading days prior to providing notice of such redemption. No sinking fund is provided for the Convertible Notes. So long as 10% of each series of Convertible Notes remain outstanding, we are restricted in the amount of indebtedness we may incur without the consent of holders of at least 55% of the then-outstanding aggregate principal amount of the relevant series of Convertible Notes. The Convertible Notes contain customary anti-dilution adjustments. Each indenture contains customary events of default, the occurrence of which would enable the Trustee or the holders of at least 25% in aggregate principal amount of such series of Convertible Notes to accelerate our obligations under such Convertible Notes.
Contractual Obligations and Commitments
As of January 31, 2026, our commitments consisted of (i) obligations under operating leases for offices and data centers on an undiscounted basis, of which $12.8 million is due within 12 months and $30.6 million is due thereafter, (ii) Convertible Note obligations, with an aggregate principal amount of $401 million, due in fiscal 2029 and an aggregate principal amount of $75 million due in fiscal 2030, and (iii) purchase obligations with various parties relating to cloud infrastructure and data center costs, network transit expenses, sales and marketing activities, and software subscription arrangements, of which $56.5 million is due within the next 12 months and $262.3 million is due thereafter.
Critical Accounting Policies and Estimates
Our consolidated financial statements and related notes thereto included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K are prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP. The preparation of consolidated financial statements requires us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets, liabilities, revenue, expenses, and related disclosures. Our estimates are based on historical experience and various other assumptions that we believe to be reasonable under the circumstances, and we evaluate our estimates and assumptions on an ongoing basis. Actual results could differ significantly from the estimates made by management. To the extent that there are differences between our estimates and actual results, our future financial statement presentation, financial condition, operating results, and cash flows will be affected.
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The critical accounting policies requiring estimates, assumptions, and judgments that we believe to have the most significant impact on our consolidated financial statements are described below. Refer to Note 2, Basis of Presentation and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies, in the Notes to our Consolidated Financial Statements included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K for further information on our other significant accounting policies.
Revenue Recognition
We generate revenue primarily from sales of subscriptions to access our platform, along with related support services. Customers receive continuous access to our platform and do not have the right to take possession of the software.
We account for revenue contracts with customers in accordance with ASC 606, Revenue from Contracts with Customers. Revenue is recognized when, or as, control of a promised service is transferred to the customer in an amount that reflects the consideration we expect to be entitled to in exchange for those services.
Contracts with customers may contain multiple performance obligations. Our contracts are generally non-cancellable over the contractual term and are subject to standard terms and conditions. Any non-standard terms are evaluated on a case-by-case basis to determine their impact on the timing of revenue recognition.
Common Stock Valuations
Prior to the IPO, the fair value of the common stock underlying our stock-based awards has historically been determined by our board of directors, with input from management and reference to contemporaneous unrelated independent third-party valuations. We believe that our board of directors had the relevant experience and expertise to determine the fair value of our common stock. Given the absence of a public trading market of our common stock, and in accordance with the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants Practice Aid, Valuation of Privately-Held-Company Equity Securities Issued as Compensation , our board of directors exercised reasonable judgment and considered numerous objective and subjective factors to determine the best estimate of the fair value of our common stock. These factors included, but were not limited to:
the results of contemporaneous independent third-party valuations of our common stock;
the prices, rights, preferences, and privileges of our convertible preferred stock relative to those of its common stock;
the lack of marketability of our common stock;
actual operating and financial results;
current business conditions and projections;
the operational and financial performance of comparable publicly traded companies;
the likelihood of achieving a liquidity event, such as an initial public offering or sale of our Company, given prevailing market conditions; and
the U.S. and global capital market conditions and overall economic conditions.
When we estimated the fair value of our business prior to the IPO, we allocated such fair value to each class of stock using the Option Pricing Method ("OPM"), or a hybrid of the Probability Weighted Expected Return Method ("PWERM") and OPM. When using the PWERM, a probability-weighted analysis of values for our common stock was estimated assuming possible future events for our company, including a scenario assuming we become a publicly traded company and a scenario assuming we continue as a privately held company. A discount for lack of marketability was applied to the resulting per share value to arrive at the fair value of our common stock on a non-marketable basis.
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In addition, prior to the IPO, we considered any secondary transactions involving our common stock. In our evaluation of those transactions, we considered the facts and circumstances of each transaction to determine the extent to which they represented a fair value exchange. Factors considered include transaction volume, the number of participants, timing, whether the transactions occurred between willing and unrelated parties, and whether the transactions involved parties with access to our financial information.
A change in the estimated fair value of our common stock could have a significant effect on the fair value of the equity awards that we granted prior to the IPO and the corresponding stock-based compensation that we already recognized and the remaining amount that we still have to recognize.
Following the IPO, the fair value of our Class A common stock is based on the closing price as reported on the date of grant on the stock exchange on which we are listed.
Fair Value Assumptions of Convertible Notes
We account for the Convertible Notes under the fair value option election of ASC 825 , Financial Instruments , as the Convertible Notes are a financial instrument containing embedded features where the entire financial instrument is measured at its issue-date estimated fair value and then subsequently remeasured at estimated fair value on a recurring basis at each reporting period date. Prior to the IPO, the fair value of the Convertible Notes was measured using a scenario-based binomial lattice model. The scenarios consisted of (a) Scenario 1 - likelihood of achieving a liquidity event, such as an initial public offering ("IPO") and (b) Scenario 2 - we will remain private. The determination of the fair value of the Convertible Notes is complex and highly judgmental due to the significant estimation of inputs, such as the fair value of common stock, the volatility of the common stock, the time to expiration of the Convertible Notes, credit spread, and the risk-free interest rate for a period that approximates the time to expiration.
Following the IPO, the fair value of the Convertible Notes is measured using a single-scenario lattice model that incorporates the trading price of the Company's Class A common stock data, risk-free interest rate, and estimated credit spread.
We performed sensitivity analyses on the key inputs and assumptions used in determining the estimated fair value of Convertible Notes. Assuming all other assumptions and inputs used in the valuation models are held constant, a hypothetical 10% increase in the fair value of our common stock would result in an increase in the fair value of our Convertible Notes of approximately $7.1 million as of January 31, 2026, whereas a hypothetical 10% decrease would result in a decrease in the fair value of our Convertible Notes of approximately $5.9 million as of January 31, 2026.
Recent Accounting Pronouncements
For a description of our recently adopted accounting pronouncements and recently issued accounting standards not yet adopted, see Note 2 "Basis of Presentation and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies" in the Notes to our Consolidated Financial Statements included elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
JOBS Act Accounting Election
We are an emerging growth company, as defined in the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012 (the "JOBS Act"). The JOBS Act provides that an emerging growth company can take advantage of an extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards. This provision allows an emerging growth company to delay the adoption of some accounting standards until those standards would otherwise apply to private companies. We have elected to use this extended transition period until the earlier of the date we (i) are no longer an emerging growth company or (ii) affirmatively and irrevocably opt out of the extended transition period provided in the JOBS Act. As a result, our financial statements may not be comparable to companies that comply with new or revised accounting pronouncements as of public company effective dates.
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Ite m 7A. Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk.
We have operations in the United States and internationally, and we are exposed to market risk in the ordinary course of our business.
Interest Rate Risk
As of January 31, 2026, we had a total of $1.2 billion of cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities, which consisted primarily of money market funds, commercial paper, corporate debt securities, asset-back securities, U.S. Treasury, and government agency securities. We also had $1.2 million of restricted cash as of January 31, 2026, primarily due to collateral in connection with certain facility lease agreements. Our cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities bear interest and are held for working capital purposes. We do not enter into investments for trading or speculative purposes. Interest rates on the Convertible Notes are fixed, however, the fair value of the Convertible Notes are exposed to interest rate risk. Generally, the interest rate related to the changes in the U.S. Treasury rate will not significantly impact Convertible Notes valuation. We do not believe a hypothetical 10% increase or decrease in interest rates would have resulted in a material impact to our operating results.
Currency Risk
The vast majority of our sales contracts are denominated in U.S. dollars, with a small number of contracts denominated in foreign currencies. A portion of our operating expenses are incurred outside the United States, denominated in foreign currencies and subject to fluctuations due to changes in foreign currency exchange rates, particularly changes in the Indian Rupee, Taiwanese Dollar, and Euro. Our consolidated results of operations and cash flows may be adversely affected in the future due to changes in foreign exchange rates. To date, we have not entered into any hedging arrangements with respect to foreign currency risk or other derivative financial instruments, although we may choose to do so in the future. We do not believe a hypothetical 10% increase or decrease in the relative value of the U.S. dollar to other foreign currencies would have a material impact on our results of operations.
Inflation Rate Risk
We do not believe that inflation has had a material effect on our business, financial condition or results of operations. Nonetheless, if our costs were to become subject to significant inflationary pressures, we may not be able to fully offset such higher costs through price increases. Our inability or failure to do so could harm our business, financial condition and results of operations.
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