S-1/A 1 d200167ds1a.htm S-1/A S-1/A
Table of Contents

As filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on June 10, 2021.

Registration No. 333-255190

 

 

 

UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

 

 

Amendment No. 3

to

FORM S-1

REGISTRATION STATEMENT

UNDER

THE SECURITIES ACT OF 1933

 

 

TaskUs, Inc.

(Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in its Charter)

 

Delaware   7374   83-1586636

(State or other jurisdiction of

incorporation or organization)

 

(Primary Standard Industrial

Classification Code Number)

 

(I.R.S. Employer

Identification No.)

1650 Independence Drive, Suite 100

New Braunfels, Texas 78132

Telephone: (888) 400-8275

(Address, including zip code, and telephone number, including area code, of Registrant’s principal executive offices)

 

 

Jeffrey Chugg

Vice President, Legal

TaskUs, Inc.

1650 Independence Drive, Suite 100

New Braunfels, Texas 78132

Telephone: (888) 400-8275

(Name, address, including zip code, and telephone number, including area code, of agent for service)

 

 

 

Copies to:

Joshua Ford Bonnie

Edgar J. Lewandowski

Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP

425 Lexington Avenue

New York, New York 10017

Telephone: (212) 455-2000

 

Byron B. Rooney

Emily Roberts

Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP

450 Lexington Avenue

New York, New York 10017

Telephone: (212) 450-4000

 

 

Approximate date of commencement of the proposed sale of the securities to the public: As soon as practicable after the Registration Statement is declared effective.

 

 

If any of the securities being registered on this form are to be offered on a delayed or continuous basis pursuant to Rule 415 under the Securities Act of 1933, check the following box.  ☐

If this form is filed to register additional securities for an offering pursuant to Rule 462(b) under the Securities Act, please check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering.  ☐

If this form is a post-effective amendment filed pursuant to Rule 462(c) under the Securities Act, check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering.  ☐

If this form is a post-effective amendment filed pursuant to Rule 462(d) under the Securities Act, check the following box and list the Securities Act registration statement number of the earlier effective registration statement for the same offering.  ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, a smaller reporting company or an emerging growth company. See the definitions of “large accelerated filer,” “accelerated filer,” “smaller reporting company” and “emerging growth company” in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act.

 

Large accelerated filer      Accelerated filer  
Non-accelerated filer      Smaller reporting company  
     Emerging growth company  

If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 7(a)(2)(B) of the Securities Act.  ☐

 

 

CALCULATION OF REGISTRATION FEE

 

 

Title of Each Class of
Securities to be Registered
 

Amount

to be

Registered (1)(2)

 

Proposed

Maximum

Offering Price

per Share

 

Proposed

Maximum

Aggregate
Offering Price (1)(2)

  Amount of
Registration Fee (3)

Class A Common Stock, par value $0.01 per share

  15,180,000   $24.00   $364,320,000   $39,748

 

 

(1)

Includes 1,980,000 shares of Class A common stock that are subject to the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares.

(2)

Estimated solely for the purpose of determining the amount of the registration fee in accordance with Rule 457(a) under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.

(3)

Previously paid.

 

 

The Registrant hereby amends this Registration Statement on such date or dates as may be necessary to delay its effective date until the Registrant shall file a further amendment which specifically states that this Registration Statement shall thereafter become effective in accordance with Section 8(a) of the Securities Act of 1933 or until the Registration Statement shall become effective on such date as the Commission, acting pursuant to said Section 8(a), may determine.

 

 

 


Table of Contents

The information in this prospectus is not complete and may be changed. Neither we nor the selling stockholders may sell these securities until the registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission is effective. This prospectus is not an offer to sell these securities and it is not soliciting an offer to buy these securities in any jurisdiction where the offer or sale is not permitted.

 

Subject to completion, dated June 10, 2021

Preliminary Prospectus

13,200,000 Shares

 

LOGO

TaskUs, Inc.

Class A Common Stock

This is the initial public offering of shares of Class A common stock of TaskUs, Inc. No public market currently exists for our Class A common stock. We are offering 5,553,154 shares of Class A common stock in this offering, and the selling stockholders identified in this prospectus are offering 7,646,846 shares of Class A common stock. We will not receive any proceeds from the sale of shares of Class A common stock by the selling stockholders. We anticipate that the initial public offering price will be between $22.00 and $24.00 per share. We have applied to list our Class A common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market (“Nasdaq”) under the symbol “TASK.”

We have two classes of authorized common stock, Class A common stock and Class B common stock. The rights of the holders of Class A common stock and Class B common stock are identical, except with respect to voting, transfer and conversion rights. Each share of Class A common stock is entitled to one vote per share. Each share of Class B common stock is entitled to ten votes per share and is convertible at any time into one share of Class A common stock. Each share of our Class B common stock will convert automatically upon certain transfers and upon the earlier of (i) seven years from the filing and effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation in connection with this offering and (ii) (x) with respect to our Sponsor (as defined herein), the first date on which the aggregate number of shares of our Class B common stock held by our Sponsor ceases to represent at least 5% of the aggregate number of our outstanding shares of common stock and (y) with respect to each Co-Founder (as defined herein), the first date on which the aggregate number of shares of our Class B common stock held by such Co-Founder ceases to represent at least 5% of the aggregate number of our outstanding shares of common stock.

After the completion of this offering, Bryce Maddock and Jaspar Weir, the co-founders of TaskUs, Inc., and affiliates of The Blackstone Group Inc. will continue to hold all of our issued and outstanding Class B common stock and to own a majority of the voting power of shares eligible to vote in the election of our directors. As a result, we will be a “controlled company” within the meaning of the corporate governance standards of Nasdaq. See “Management—Controlled Company Exception” and “Principal and Selling Stockholders.” Following this offering, outstanding shares of Class B common stock will represent approximately 98.5% of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock immediately following this offering (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full).

We are an “emerging growth company” as defined under the federal securities laws and, as such, may elect to comply with certain reduced public company reporting requirements for future filings. See “Summary—Implications of Being an Emerging Growth Company.”

Investing in shares of our Class A common stock involves risks. See “Risk Factors” beginning on page 26 to read about factors you should consider before buying shares of our Class A common stock.

 

     Per Share      Total  

Initial public offering price

   $                        $                    

Underwriting discounts and commissions(1)

   $        $    

Proceeds, before expenses, to TaskUs, Inc.

   $        $    

Proceeds, before expenses, to the selling stockholders

   $        $    

 

(1)

See “Underwriting (Conflicts of Interest)” for additional information regarding underwriting compensation.

At our request, the underwriters have reserved up to 5% of the shares of Class A common stock offered by this prospectus for sale, at the initial public offering price, to certain individuals associated with us. See the section titled “Underwriting (Conflicts of Interest)—Directed Share Program.”

To the extent that the underwriters sell more than 13,200,000 shares of our Class A common stock, the underwriters have the option to purchase up to an additional 1,980,000 shares of our Class A common stock from the selling stockholders at the initial public offering price less the underwriting discounts and commissions, within 30 days from the date of this prospectus.

Neither the Securities and Exchange Commission nor any other regulatory body has approved or disapproved of these securities or passed upon the accuracy or adequacy of this prospectus. Any representation to the contrary is a criminal offense.

The underwriters expect to deliver the shares of our Class A common stock against payment in New York, New York on or about                 , 2021.

 

 

 

Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC    J.P. Morgan

 

BofA Securities        Morgan Stanley
Baird   RBC Capital Markets     Wells Fargo Securities    William Blair
Blackstone   TD Securities   BTIG    Fifth Third Securities
AmeriVet Securities   Blaylock Van, LLC   C.L. King & Associates    Penserra Securities LLC

The date of this prospectus is                , 2021.


Table of Contents

LOGO

Outsourcing reimagined for the innovation age. $478mm 2020 Revenue $35mm 2020 Net Income 125% Average Net Revenue Retention Rate (2018-2020) 60% Revenue CAGR (2017-2020) 72% Adj. EBITDA CAGR (2017-2020)* * For reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to the most directly comparable GAAP measure please see ”Selected Historical Consolidated Financial Data”. 72 4.6 Total Clients Glassdoor Score >$500,000 (2020) (as of March 2021)


Table of Contents

LOGO

Our People are the Di_erence


Table of Contents

LOGO

IRELAND 1 Site USA 4 Sites INDIA 1 Site COLOMBIA GREECE 1 Site MEXICO 1 Site TAIWAN 1 Site PHILIPPINES 9 Sites PHILIPPINES Geographic 9 Sites Footprint ~ 27,500* 18* 8* Employees Worldwide Locations Countries Clients #40 100+* Glassdoor’s 2019 Best of the world’s leading Places to Work technology companies * As of December 31, 2020


Table of Contents

Table of Contents

 

     Page  

Summary

     1  

Risk Factors

     26  

Forward-Looking Statements

     74  

Market and Industry Data

     75  

Trademarks, Service Marks and Trade Names

     76  

Use of Proceeds

     77  

Dividend Policy

     78  

Capitalization

     79  

Dilution

     81  

Selected Historical Consolidated Financial Data

     83  

Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

     90  

Business

     123  

Management

     153  
 

 

 

Neither we, the selling stockholders nor the underwriters have authorized anyone to provide you with information different from that contained in this prospectus, any amendment or supplement to this prospectus or any free writing prospectus prepared by us or on our behalf. Neither we, the selling stockholders nor the underwriters take any responsibility for, or can provide any assurance as to the reliability of, any information other than the information in this prospectus, any amendment or supplement to this prospectus or any free writing prospectus prepared by us or on our behalf. We, the selling stockholders and the underwriters are offering to sell, and seeking offers to buy, shares of our Class A common stock only in jurisdictions where offers and sales are permitted. The information in this prospectus is accurate only as of the date of this prospectus, regardless of the time of delivery of this prospectus or any sale of shares of our Class A common stock. Our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects may have changed since that date.

For investors outside the United States: Neither we, the selling stockholders nor the underwriters have done anything that would permit this offering or possession or distribution of this prospectus or any free writing prospectus we may provide to you in connection with this offering in any jurisdiction where action for that purpose is required, other than in the United States. You are required to inform yourselves about and to observe any restrictions relating to this offering and the distribution of this prospectus and any such free writing prospectus outside the United States.

Through and including            , 2021 (the 25th day after the date of this prospectus), all dealers effecting transactions in these securities, whether or not participating in this offering, may be required to deliver a prospectus. This is in addition to a dealer’s obligation to deliver a prospectus when acting as an underwriter and with respect to an unsold allotment or subscription.

 

i


Table of Contents

About This Prospectus

Financial Statement Presentation

This prospectus includes certain historical consolidated financial and other data for TaskUs, Inc. (formerly known as TU TopCo, Inc.), a Delaware corporation. TaskUs, Inc. was formed by investment funds affiliated with The Blackstone Group Inc. as a vehicle for the acquisition of TaskUs Holdings, Inc. (formerly known as TaskUs, Inc.), a Delaware corporation, on October 1, 2018 (the “Blackstone Acquisition”). Prior to the Blackstone Acquisition, TaskUs, Inc. had no operations and TaskUs Holdings, Inc. is the predecessor for financial reporting purposes. As a result of the Blackstone Acquisition, we applied the acquisition method of accounting and established a new basis of accounting. Accordingly, historical predecessor information presented in this prospectus does not reflect the impact of the Blackstone Acquisition and may not be comparable with historical successor information presented in this prospectus or necessarily reflect what will occur in the future. The combination of historical predecessor information from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 with historical successor information from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018 is referred to as “Full Year 2018.”

Certain Definitions

As used in this prospectus, unless otherwise noted or the context requires otherwise:

 

   

“TaskUs,” the “Company,” “we,” “us” and “our” refer (i) with respect to events occurring or periods ending before October 1, 2018, to the Predecessor, and (ii) with respect to events occurring or periods ending on or after October 1, 2018, to the Successor.

 

   

“Successor” refers to TaskUs, Inc. (formerly known as TU TopCo, Inc.) and its consolidated subsidiaries.

 

   

“TaskUs Holdings” and “Predecessor” refer to TaskUs Holdings, Inc. (formerly known as TaskUs, Inc.) and its consolidated subsidiaries.

 

   

“Blackstone” or “our Sponsor” refers to investment funds associated with The Blackstone Group Inc.

 

   

“Client Net Promoter Score” or “cNPS” refers to a percentage, expressed as a numerical value from -100 to 100, to gauge client satisfaction based on our internal client satisfaction survey, using the question “How likely are you to recommend TaskUs to a friend or a colleague?” on a 0 to 10 scale. Responses of nine or ten are considered “promoters” and responses of six or less are considered “detractors.” The percentage of respondents who are detractors is subtracted from the percentage of respondents who are promoters, and the resulting percentage is the Client Net Promoter Score. cNPS for a given period reflects all client satisfaction survey responses received during that period. TaskUs runs its cNPS survey approximately every six months.

 

   

“Co-Founders” refers to our co-founders: Bryce Maddock, our Chief Executive Officer and a member of our board of directors; and Jaspar Weir, our President and a member of our board of directors.

 

   

“Employee Net Promoter Score” or “eNPS” refers to a percentage, expressed as a numerical value from -100 to 100, to gauge employee satisfaction based on our internal employee satisfaction survey, using the question “How likely are you to recommend TaskUs to a friend or colleague?” on a 0 to 10 scale. Responses of nine or ten are considered “promoters” and responses of six or less are considered “detractors.” The percentage of respondents who are detractors is subtracted from the percentage of respondents who are promoters, and the resulting percentage is the Employee Net Promoter Score. eNPS for a given period reflects all employee satisfaction survey responses received during that period. TaskUs runs its eNPS survey approximately every three months.

 

   

“Existing owners” or “pre-IPO owners” refers collectively to Blackstone, the Co-Founders and the management and other equity holders who are the owners of TaskUs immediately prior to the consummation of this offering.

 

ii


Table of Contents
   

“Fill rate” refers to the rate at which we hire full-time employees for posted open positions for a campaign during a given year and is calculated as a quotient of hired headcount divided by required headcount.

 

   

“Headcount” refers to TaskUs employees as of the end of a given measurement period.

 

   

“Implementation Net Promoter Score” or “iNPS” refers to a percentage, expressed as a numerical value from -100 to 100, to gauge client satisfaction with an implementation project performed by TaskUs using the question “How likely are you to recommend your implementation experience with your TaskUs Project Manager to a friend or colleague?” on a 0 to 10 scale. Responses of nine or ten are considered “promoters” and responses of six or less are considered “detractors.” The percentage of respondents who are detractors is subtracted from the percentage of respondents who are promoters, and the resulting percentage is the Implementation Net Promoter Score. iNPS for a given period reflects all implementation satisfaction survey responses received during that period. TaskUs runs its iNPS survey at the completion of each implementation project and summarizes survey results periodically.

 

   

“Internal referral rate” for a given period refers to the percentage of the number of employees hired during that period who were sourced from referrals by existing employees.

 

   

“Net revenue retention rate” for a given fiscal year is calculated using a measurement period consisting of the two consecutive fiscal years ending with and including the most recent applicable fiscal year. Next, we define our “base cohort” as the population of clients that were using our services during the entire 12-month period of the first year of the measurement period. Net revenue retention rate is calculated as the quotient obtained by dividing (a) the revenue generated by the base cohort in the second year of measurement by (b) the revenue generated by the base cohort in the first year of measurement.

 

   

“New client win” refers to a new business opportunity awarded from a company that was not an existing client. When referencing the number of new client wins in a given year, it refers to companies with which TaskUs did not have a business relationship in the prior year.

 

   

“Recurring revenue contract” refers to contracts we have entered into with our clients for our services and solutions for which revenue is recognized over time and under which revenue is expected to continue into the future. A typical recurring revenue contract has a term of one to two years and has an automatic renewal provision.

 

   

“Win rate” refers to the percentage of new business opportunities that we were awarded out of all opportunities closed in the period for which we submitted a proposal during the same period. We calculate win rate for a given period as the quotient of the total estimated annual revenue value for our services and solutions under our client contracts, estimated as of the date of each client contract (excluding any estimated project-based revenue value and any estimated revenue value during the implementation period for such client contract) for all opportunities closed as “won” divided by the total estimated annual revenue value for our services and solutions under our client contracts, estimated as of the date of each client contract (excluding any estimated project-based revenue value and any estimated revenue value during the implementation period for such client contract) for all opportunities closed as either “won” or “lost,” in each case during that period. Excluded from this calculation are all opportunities closed as “disqualified” because they never reached the proposal stage.

 

 

Unless indicated otherwise, the information included in this prospectus assumes:

 

   

no exercise by the underwriters of their option to purchase up to an additional 1,980,000 shares of Class A common stock from the selling stockholders;

 

iii


Table of Contents
   

that the shares of Class A common stock to be sold in this offering are sold at $23.00 per share of Class A common stock, which is the midpoint of the price range indicated on the front cover of this prospectus; and

 

   

a ten-for-one forward split of our common stock, to occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part and prior to the closing of this offering.

The financial statements and the related notes thereto included elsewhere in this prospectus, including the share and per share information therein, are presented only on a historical basis and therefore do not reflect the ten-for-one forward stock split of our common stock.

 

iv


Table of Contents

LOGO

A note from Bryce & Jaspar, Co-Founders The TaskUs story started long before the founding of our company in 2008, in the halls of Santa Monica High School where two best friends decided they wanted to go into business together. After college, at the age of 22, with five years of “entrepreneurial experience” under our belts, we started TaskUs. The initial concept was to provide busy professionals with task-based virtual assistants working from the Philippines. We used our combined life savings to rent a one room office on the side of a highway an hour south of Manila and hire our first few employees. The first TaskUs office (actually just the two windows in the upper left above the mechanic shop) As we pounded the pavement trying to sell this new service, we met other startup founders who shared two common traits. First, they had zero interest in tasked-based virtual assistants. And second, as their companies grew rapidly they struggled to efficiently scale their operations. So we pivoted the business to address this latter challenge. Somehow, we persuaded a few venture-backed companies into giving us a shot. At the start, these companies only trusted us to handle the most basic of work: data entry and transcription. But, as we earned their trust, we took on more critical parts of their operations such as advanced technical support and critical content review. Satisfied startup founders referred us to other startups and in time we found ourselves supporting dozens of rapidly growing companies. We bootstrapped TaskUs for our first seven years in business. What we lacked in capital we made up for in creativity. We leveraged SaaS products in the early days of cloud technology to enable us to scale in an agile and capital efficient manner. We harnessed web, mobile, and software tools to compete for and win greenfield opportunities, as well as large RFPs, where frankly, we did not belong. We streamlined the hiring and training of teammates to a matter of days rather than weeks or months.


Table of Contents

LOGO

We looked around at who we were competing with for talent, and saw many traditional out-sourced service providers who were notorious for high attrition rates and awful working environments. In contrast to this, we took the best aspects of our startup clients’ cultures and became obsessed with the idea that we could deliver better results for our clients by focusing on the wellbeing of our teammates. We created a new, tech-enabled business service provider Our clients were scaling businesses that had never existed before, from mobile social networks to on-demand food delivery to cryptocurrency exchanges. Accordingly, we developed successful new service offerings, like content security, multi-sided marketplace support, and fintech compliance services. We applied technology everywhere we could, from how we trained and coached teammates to lightweight browser extensions that suggested optimal customer-service responses to our teammates regardless of which CRM our clients used. We created a new breed of service provider, one that is as flexible and agile as our rapidly growing and evolving clients. Just as our clients have disrupted their respective markets, we have disrupted ours. As of March 31, 2021, TaskUs has grown to over 27,500 teammates working from 18 offices in eight countries around the world, as well as from our global work-from-home platform, Cirrus. Revenues have grown organically at a 60% CAGR between 2017 and 2020, with an average net revenue retention rate of 125% from 2018 to 2020. We provide specialized services to the world’s largest technology companies and rapidly growing digital disruptors. These companies and the vertical markets that TaskUs serves are growing considerably faster than the economy as a whole. In fact, these markets are expected to grow at an average CAGR of 18% from 2019 to 2023. We expect TaskUs to benefit from the rapid growth of these vertical markets as we deepen our share of wallet with existing clients, attract new clients and expand our service offering and global footprint in the coming years. But we are just getting started In the years to come three trends will radically reshape our industry. 1. We are seeing the automation of large swathes of simple and repetitive work. For commod-itized service providers this is leading to declining revenues and margins, in a race to the bottom. 2. The acceleration of technology is making the world a far more complicated place and leading to a surge in demand for knowledge workers. Smart homes require advanced technical support, the explosion of user-generated content requires sophisticated content moderation and the future of artificial intelligence demands huge amounts of training data. 3. As the world has become comfortable with working from home, it is far less important where work is performed or whether it’s completed by in-house staff or outsourced partners. At TaskUs, we are perfectly positioned to benefit from these trends 1. We partner with our clients to accelerate the automation of simple repetitive work. Our digital team deploys proprietary and third party applications that dramatically improve efficiency and accuracy.


Table of Contents

LOGO

2. Our obsession with employee experience enables us to attract and retain talented team-mates with the skills our clients require. Being a place people really want to work allows us to deliver sophisticated technical support, challenging content moderation, and advanced AI operations. 3. Many of our disruptor clients have announced permanent shifts to 100%, or partial, work from home models. We believe this is increasing their appetite for outsourced services. We plan to build the world’s largest tech-enabled service provider We will go deeper into each of our core offerings and expand the set of specialized services that we deliver for clients. We intend to extend our global footprint to offer services in over 100 languages as well as broaden the talent base from which we can attract teammates. And, we will invest heavily in technology to drive automation for our clients and make our teammates more effective. The journey will be a long one. So we will be guided by long term, rather than quarterly thinking. Here are the principles we will stick to: 1. Frontline First—We are employee-obsessed. We believe that if we create the world’s best employee experience, we can attract and retain talent that is meaningfully better than the competition, and this talent will deliver the specialized services and differentiated results that our clients expect of us. 2. Deliver for Clients No Matter What—Our clients trust us to deliver mission-critical operations. We intend to earn that trust by delivering every time. Working for our clients is an honor that we do not take lightly. 3. Be Ridiculous—TaskUs is a collection of individual innovators and disruptors. We celebrate our differences and challenge the status-quo. No idea is too crazy or unorthodox to be considered. 4. Growth and Profitability—We are focused on delivering sustained, high growth. While we prioritize growth, our growth has not come at the expense of profits. We drive efficiency into our own operations, in the same way we do for clients. Running lean core operations has enabled us to invest in long-term innovation, while delivering consistent margins. It is hard to describe just how surreal it feels to be writing this letter. We did not chart and execute a flawless vision. Building TaskUs has required constant iteration and, some would say, foolish determination. Luckily, these are values we share with our disruptive clients. If you had told us 12 years ago that we’d have grown TaskUs to 27,500 teammates serving over 100 of the most innovative companies in history, it would have been hard to believe. Having come this far, we are so excited for what comes next. None of this would have been possible without the incredible colleagues, clients, mentors and investors we have worked with along the way. Thank you all for daring to Be Ridiculous! Bryce & Jaspar


Table of Contents

SUMMARY

This summary highlights information contained elsewhere in this prospectus and does not contain all of the information you should consider before investing in shares of our Class A common stock. You should read this entire prospectus carefully, including the section entitled “Risk Factors,” “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and the financial statements and the related notes thereto included elsewhere in this prospectus, before you decide to invest in shares of our Class A common stock. Unless otherwise indicated, references to our “common stock” include our Class A common stock and Class B common stock.

Overview

Technology is changing the world, and this transformation is being led by the Digital Economy, an expanding set of modern companies using a combination of internet, cloud and mobile infrastructure to deliver economic value to consumers. These companies are responsible for revolutionizing many aspects of our daily lives, including the ways in which we socialize, shop, dine, date, travel and invest.

The impact of the Digital Economy has also radically altered the market landscape. As of December 31, 2020, technology companies represented 66% of the total market capitalization of the world’s twenty most highly valued public companies, up from just 16% in 2010. In the global private markets, as of December 2020, there were more than 580 companies with greater than a $1 billion valuation (“unicorns”), including more than 30 with greater than a $10 billion valuation (“decacorns”), as compared to 80 unicorns and eight decacorns as of January 2015.

These high growth companies are focused on developing new products or services and often lack the desire, expertise, scale and/or geographic presence to build the operational infrastructure to support their growth. We are the outsourcing partner of choice for many of the most disruptive brands in the world. We help support the growth of our innovative clients by providing technology-enabled outsourcing solutions purpose-built for the Digital Economy.

TaskUs presents a diversified opportunity to participate in the growth of the Digital Economy and has a strong track record of profitability.

We are a digital outsourcer, focused on serving high-growth technology companies to represent, protect and grow their brands. We serve our clients to support their end customers’ urgent needs, navigate an increasingly-complex compliance landscape, and handle sensitive tasks, including online content moderation. As of December 31, 2020, we had over 100 clients spanning numerous industry segments within the Digital Economy, including social media, e-commerce, gaming, streaming media, food delivery and ride sharing, HiTech, FinTech and HealthTech. Between 2019 and 2023, the verticals we prioritize are projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (“CAGR”) of 18%.

As our clients grow, we are the beneficiary of increased outsourcing volumes and incremental revenue as we enable our clients to focus on their core businesses. Between 2017 and 2020, our current clients with publicly disclosed financials grew their revenue at an estimated unweighted average CAGR of 40%. Over the same period, TaskUs achieved a revenue CAGR of 60% as we grew with our existing clients and added new clients.

Our global, omni-channel delivery model is focused on providing our clients three key services – Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and AI Operations. 96% of our revenue in 2020 was delivered from non-voice, digital channels or omni-channel services. Non-voice channels allow us to utilize resources efficiently, thereby driving higher profitability.



 

1


Table of Contents

LOGO

Our differentiated set of digitally focused service offerings are leveraged by many of the world’s most recognizable technology brands, including Zoom, Netflix, Uber, Coinbase and Oscar.

Our Digital Customer Experience offerings serve the needs of the modern consumer, whose habits have drastically changed in the past decade and revolve around the smartphone. Whether it’s an app being used to deliver food instantly, securely buy and sell stocks or stream their favorite shows, it is easy to forget that these pocket luxuries were nascent or nonexistent ten years ago. Each of these are examples of emerging industries that have become strategic growth drivers for TaskUs. In particular, Zoom, Netflix, Uber, Coinbase and Oscar are representative clients in HiTech, streaming media, food delivery and ride sharing, FinTech and HealthTech verticals, respectively, each of which turned to us when it faced logistical challenges during its rapid growth cycle and none of which represented more than 6% of our revenue in 2019 and 2020.

With the explosive growth of user-generated content and social media, issues of censorship, community moderation and foreign interference in democratic election processes have become some of the most important socio-political issues of our time. Our Content Security offerings include content monitoring and moderation services (“Content Security”), the need for which is increasingly critical to protect the sanctity of the open internet. Our artificial intelligence (“AI”) Operations offerings include providing high quality, human-annotated data sets and algorithm training services to our clients as they navigate significant increases in the prevalence of disruptive AI technology.

We have a track record of using thesis-led prospecting strategies to identify attractive and emerging industry segments in their infancy, win marquee clients and establish thought leadership and operating best practices. Our early-mover position and the willingness of our clients to serve as references have had a snowball effect in winning additional new clients, which continues to reinforce our market leadership.

Our agile and responsive operational model allows us to selectively target high-potential clients who have never outsourced before. Since 2017, over 50 of our clients trusted TaskUs to be their first outsourcer in our areas of service, driven by their understanding that we have the rare ability to support clients on their journey from startup to global enterprise.

Our delivery model is tailored to meet the needs of high-growth companies. Our cloud-based technology infrastructure is designed to enable clients to set up operations quickly and seamlessly and allows clients to outsource many of their core processes at earlier stages of their company lifecycle. We prioritize data science and process automation to achieve technology-driven efficiency gains. We continually analyze massive amounts of data obtained from customer interactions we manage for our clients. We leverage these insights and end customer-driven feedback to drive workflow efficiencies, deliver insights on predictive behaviors that lead to lower customer churn and help our clients innovate their core product offerings and develop new product features.

At TaskUs, culture is at the heart of everything we do.

Our Co-Founders, who started TaskUs twelve years ago and still lead us today, believe that serving frontline employees helps us better serve our clients. As we have expanded across the globe, we strive to champion our Co-Founders’ vision of operational excellence through an employee-centric culture at every site. As of March 31,



 

2


Table of Contents

2021, we had approximately 27,500 employees across eighteen locations in eight countries. In 2020, our employee net promoter score (“eNPS”) was 72, and 79% of our employees who participated rated us 9 or 10 on a scale of 10. Glassdoor ranked us number 40 on their 2019 Best Places to Work list among U.S. employers with at least 1,000 employees, and we held a rating of 4.6 out of 5.0 as of March 2021.

Many of the companies operating in the Digital Economy are well-known for their obsession with creating a world-class employee experience. We believe clients choose TaskUs in part because they view our company culture as aligned with their own, which enables us to act as a natural extension of their brands and gives us an advantage in the recruitment of highly engaged frontline teammates who produce better results. We use eNPS and client net promoter scores (“cNPS”) to measure the satisfaction each group has with TaskUs. Our 2020 full year cNPS was 75. We believe both our eNPS and cNPS metrics to be industry-leading.

Recurring revenue model with a track record of high growth and profitability at scale.

LOGO

 

*

2018 refers to Full Year 2018

We believe that we have delivered industry-leading growth and profitability. In 2020, over 99% of our revenues came from recurring revenue contracts, and we achieved a net revenue retention rate of 117% in 2020. In 2020 and for the three-month period ended March 31, 2021, we delivered revenue of $478.0 million and $152.9 million, respectively, net income of $34.5 million and $16.5 million, respectively, at a net income margin of 7.2% and 10.8%, respectively, Adjusted Net Income of $69.4 million and $28.2 million, respectively, at an Adjusted Net Income Margin of 14.5% and 18.4%, respectively, and Adjusted EBITDA of $106.9 million and $39.5 million, respectively, at an Adjusted EBITDA Margin of 22.4% and 25.9%, respectively. From 2017 to 2020, our revenue grew organically at a 60% CAGR, our net income grew at a 56% CAGR, and our Adjusted EBITDA grew at a 72% CAGR.

For reconciliations of Adjusted EBITDA, Adjusted EBITDA Margin, Adjusted Net Income and Adjusted Net Income Margin to the most directly comparable measures calculated in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States (“GAAP”), information about why we consider such measures useful and a discussion of the material risks and limitations of these measures, please see “Selected Historical Consolidated Financial Data” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Non-GAAP Financial Measures.”



 

3


Table of Contents

Market Opportunity

The aggregate size of our market opportunity is over $100 billion, and consists of the following service offerings:

Digital Customer Experience: IDC estimates that global customer care outsourcing services spend was $77 billion in 2020. We focus on the fast growing digitally enabled consumer brands and traditional players catering to their customers in multiple channels. According to Everest Group, the digital customer experience market is projected to grow at a 20-25% CAGR from 2018 to 2021 and will continue to drive overall industry growth.

Content Security: According to Domo, every minute, Facebook users upload 147,000 photos, Instagram users post 347,222 stories and YouTube users upload 500 hours of video. JC Market Research estimates that the content moderation solutions market was $5.3 billion in 2020. Further, Everest Group estimates that the market will grow at a CAGR of 40-50% from 2016 to 2021.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Operations: The development of Artificial Intelligence technology often requires massive amounts of data that has been annotated by human experts and must be refined through ongoing manual training. These factors have significantly contributed to the growth of the AI services market served by our AI Operations service offering, which includes data labelling and algorithm training. IDC predicts that the worldwide AI services market will grow from $18.4 billion in 2020 to $37.8 billion in 2024 at a CAGR of 20% over the four-year period.

 

LOGO

 

Sources: Everest Group (Digital CX and Content Security); IDC, Worldwide Artificial Intelligence Services Forecast, 4 year CAGR from 2020-2024, August 2020 (AI Services).

Our strategy is to target the intersection of these high growth service offerings across attractive vertical markets in the Digital Economy. According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Digital Economy accounted for 9% of U.S. gross domestic product in 2018, or $1.8 trillion, and grew at four times the rate of overall U.S. economic growth from 2006 to 2018.



 

4


Table of Contents

The vertical markets we prioritize are projected to grow at an unweighted average CAGR of 18% from 2019 to 2023:

 

LOGO

 

Sources: The Business Research Company; TechSci Research; Technavio; Allied Market Research; and eMarketer.

Key Industry Trends

As technology and the internet have fundamentally transformed the way consumers seek to engage with their favorite brands, a number of trends have emerged that benefit our clients and increase their demand for our solutions, including:

Rapid growth in the Digital Economy: New and emerging digital trends such as the Internet of Things (“IoT”), cloud computing, mobile web services and AI are radically changing the business ecosystem and creating new opportunities for economic growth. Their success is evidenced by the rise in the volume of technology initial public offerings along with venture capital and private equity investments over the past 10 years.

Technology companies are outsourcing at an accelerating pace: As technology companies scale, they must dedicate resources across product development and operations. However, they often lack the physical capacity or desire to develop operational infrastructure internally as they focus on growing their core offerings. As a result, we believe technology companies are increasingly willing to outsource at earlier stages of their lifecycles and are driving outsized growth within the overall outsourcing industry.

COVID-19 accelerating outsourcing spend: As businesses are forced to learn how to work remotely, we believe it is becoming less important where employees are physically located or whether they are employed directly or by an outsourced partner. According to a recent survey by a third-party outsourcing company of more than 200 business leaders and decision-makers, 52% of respondents with 1,000 to 10,000 employees and 61% of respondents with 10,000 to 50,000 employees planned to outsource for the first time or increase the use of outsourcing in 2021.

Alignment of vendor company culture: We believe that vendor company culture is the number one selection criteria when digital economy companies evaluate outsourcing vendors. Companies understand that consumers increasingly want to feel a personal connection to the brands they interact with. This trend accelerates the need for next-generation outsourcers to act as extensions of their clients’ brands so that end customers receive the personal experiences they desire.



 

5


Table of Contents

Customer experience is a critical retention and growth lever, rather than a cost center: According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers study on customer experience, 59% of Americans will walk away from a brand they love after several bad experiences and 17% after just one bad experience. This direct impact of negative experiences on brand affinity coupled with relatively high customer acquisition costs for new economy companies, underscores the importance of active customer retention efforts.

Significant increase in user and advertiser generated content and the need for content moderation: According to Technavio, there were nearly four billion social media users worldwide as of 2020, leading to unprecedented amounts of user generated content. As a result, social media platforms have attracted billions of advertising dollars from a significant number of advertisers. There are regulatory and reputational risks, as well as billions of dollars of revenue streams at stake, for these platforms if sensitive content is not properly moderated.

Advancement of AI technologies requires large sets of annotated data: AI use cases are growing quickly and the success of AI companies will be determined in large part by the accuracy of their algorithms, which are inextricably linked to the quality of underlying data sets which must be manually annotated by trained experts. We believe that as AI continues to grow, so too will outsourcing opportunities.

Competitive Strengths

We have distinguished ourselves as a leader in next-generation technology-enabled outsourced services by leveraging several competitive strengths, including:

High Growth Technology Is Not a Segment of Our Business, It Is Our Business: We view technology as a macro trend that transcends all industries, whereas we believe most of our competitors view technology as one of their many client verticals. We have been able to develop deep expertise across several sub-verticals that comprise this high growth market, including food delivery, e-commerce, FinTech and social media. We facilitate millions of interactions between our clients and their respective end customers on a daily basis. We leverage insights from this constant flow of activity to better understand the particular challenges and trends in each niche market, which enables us to drive best practices across our client base. We believe each additional satisfied client enhances our brand’s reputation as the top provider of outsourced services for high growth technology companies.



 

6


Table of Contents

The following chart shows our percentage of clients by vertical, as of December 31, 2020:

 

LOGO

Digitally Native: Being a 12-year-old outsourcer means we were “born on the web and grew up in the cloud,” allowing us to enter the market without investing in legacy infrastructure. We are adept at executing work in digital channels such as chat, native in-app messaging, short message service (“SMS”), and social channels. 96% of our revenue in 2020 was delivered from non-voice, digital channels or omni-channel services, and our technology infrastructure is cloud-based.

Agility and Responsiveness at Scale: We know how to get the job done—quickly. We move swiftly and we think differently. From the pre-contract engagement of our Project Management Organization to our decentralized “Site ‘CEO’ Model,” we are purpose built for speed to support our clients’ ever-changing needs. We believe these characteristics provide a differentiated ability to thrive in high growth and large-scale environments. We reacted to the novel coronavirus (“COVID-19”) pandemic swiftly, enabling over 90% of our workforce to work-from-home soon after the commencement of lockdowns.

Leadership in Content Security: The growth of social media platforms and the need to secure the user and advertiser generated content on these platforms has led to an explosion in demand for content moderation services. As of March 31, 2021, we had approximately 4,000 front line teammates performing work in Content Security dealing with misinformation, offensive content, and critical policy issues. To care for their health and wellbeing, we have developed the TaskUs Resiliency Studio, a clinician-led and evidence-based psychological health and safety program. We couple this with advanced policy management expertise and an agile product development team focused on tools and innovation. We believe our revenue CAGR of 157% in this service offering from 2017 to 2020 is evidence that our clients view this offering as critical and differentiated.

Employer of Choice: Our culture has been recognized internationally, with accolades such as number 40 on Glassdoor’s 2019 Best Places to Work among large U.S. employers and Platinum Employer of the Year in 2018, according to Investors in People. We believe our eNPS of 72 in 2020 is higher than any other tech-enabled service provider with over 1,000 employees. We believe this not only drives higher quality work and lower attrition, but also enables us to nimbly recruit additional employees to accommodate growth. For example in 2020, 38% of our new hires came from internal referrals, helping us achieve a 101% fill rate.



 

7


Table of Contents

Founder-Led, Organic Growth Engine: Our Co-Founders and seasoned management team have meticulously built our employer brand and the agile operating model we rely upon to deliver for high growth clients. We believe we are the only company in our sector with over $250 million in annual revenues that has grown 100% organically, leading to consistency in operations and culture which provides a strong foundation for future potential growth, organic or inorganic. This strategy has helped TaskUs deliver 60% CAGR in revenues from 2017 to 2020.

Growth Strategy

We intend to continue our accelerated growth trajectory through several attractive and actionable opportunities, including:

Growing with our Current Clients: As of December 31, 2020, we served over 100 of the world’s leading technology companies, and between 2017 and 2020, our current clients with publicly disclosed financials grew their revenue at an estimated unweighted average CAGR of 40%. As our clients’ revenue and scale have grown at rapid rates, so have our outsourcing volumes, revenue and service relationships. Revenue from TaskUs clients who have been with us since 2017 grew by 448% through the end of 2020, based on 29 clients who generated $500,000 or more in revenue for each of those years. In addition, our average annual net revenue retention rate between 2018 and 2020 was 125% and our cNPS score has increased from 35 in 2017 to 75 in 2020.

Extending Solutions with Current Clients: We have a significant opportunity to enhance the penetration of current services as well as cross-sell new services. We aim to bolster our portfolio of highly complementary service capabilities by integrating consultative expertise, process automation, and technology that further expand our value proposition to clients. Services such as Content Security, which grew at a CAGR of 157% between 2017 and 2020, anti-money laundering, fraud prevention and data science are areas we believe are particularly attractive and highly relevant for our forward-leaning technology client base.

New Client Wins: We are well positioned within multi-billion dollar commercial markets with massive addressable spend opportunities where we focus on culturally aligned, agile companies that plan to scale rapidly. We plan to take advantage of our brand position and highly effective sales team, modeled after software-as-a-service (“SaaS”) industry practices, to continue to diversify our client base and add more enterprise-class technology brands to our client list. We had a total of 36 new clients in 2020, and win rates of 56%. Our total new client win rate from 2018 to 2020 was 42%.

Expanding Geographically: Global presence and multilingual capabilities are of increasing importance to our multinational clients and potential clients. The number of clients working with TaskUs in multiple geographies more than doubled from 2017 to 2020. New geographies mean new languages and/or capabilities to offer to our clients and increasing opportunities to win new business.

Pursuing Opportunistic M&A: We intend to continue to evaluate M&A opportunities to expand into higher value services, add new geographies or add additional capabilities to support our teammates in delivering exceptional service. Consistent with this strategy, we regularly evaluate potential acquisition opportunities, including ones that would be significant to us. We cannot predict the timing of any contemplated transactions, and none are currently probable.



 

8


Table of Contents

Solutions and Services

We work with disruptive technology companies in different stages of their life cycle ranging from high-growth venture capital-backed companies to innovative global public companies. The TaskUs platform is purpose-built and organized around the following three service offerings:

 

   

Digital Customer Experience: Principally consists of omni-channel customer care services primarily delivered through digital (non-voice) channels. Other solutions include customer care services for new product or market launches, trust & safety solutions and customer acquisition solutions.

 

   

Content Security: Principally consists of review and disposition of user and advertiser generated content for purposes which include removal or labeling of policy violating, offensive or misleading content. We are developing and enforcing Content Security policies in several areas including intellectual property, job and commerce postings, objectionable material and political advertising.

 

   

Artificial Intelligence Operations: Principally consists of data labeling, annotation and transcription services performed for the purpose of training and tuning AI algorithms through the process of machine learning.

For the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and Artificial Intelligence Operations represented 63%, 27% and 10%, respectively, of our total service revenue of $478.0 million for the year. For the three-month period ended March 31, 2021, Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and Artificial Intelligence Operations represented 65%, 24% and 11%, respectively, of our total service revenue of $152.9 million for the period.

Digital Customer Experience

Our clients in Digital Customer Experience (“Digital CX”) are predominantly online or app-based businesses transforming industries such as ride-sharing, e-commerce, food and grocery delivery, streaming media, and online digital marketplaces. Our digitally native service offerings enable us to utilize lower cost non-voice channels. We leverage chat, social, in-app support, SMS, and in-platform solutions and apply an “automation first” mentality to our client engagements.

We execute these solutions through our team of highly-trained and dedicated omni-channel service experts. We create a deep connection between our teammates and our clients—we become brand ambassadors for our clients and are deeply integrated in their workflows. Their success is our success.

Our Digital Customer Experience solutions include:

Omni-Channel Customer Care: Protecting and maintaining our clients’ brands makes up a significant portion of our Digital CX services. In 2020, 93% of our Digital CX revenues were generated from non-voice or omni-channels; even our pure voice work is supported by cloud-based infrastructure. We customize the support experience to the specific client and channel we operate within, across account management, billing and technical support.

New Product or Market Launches: Our clients are often in a high-stakes race to get a new product launched or enter a new market. Through the dozens of clients we have supported in these efforts, we have designed a value-added framework of product and market launch playbooks. This gives us an edge as the go-to-partner for critical new growth initiatives.

Trust & Safety: We position our most skilled teammates to perform the critical support needed to protect end users, detect and eliminate fraud, address unwanted user activity, and manage regulatory compliance.

Customer Acquisition: TaskUs supports lead research, lead generation, appointment setting, new customer outreach and activation, retention, and advanced customer conversion from free and low cost subscription/product offerings to one of higher value and profitability.



 

9


Table of Contents

Voice of the Customer: TaskUs leverages its access to a wealth of internal and external customer experience data to provide insights and feedback on customer, process and product operations and policies.

Content Security

The rise of apps and social networks has led to an explosion of user-generated content and advertising. To comply with government regulations and advertiser standards, social networks maintain complex platform policies to define what constitutes acceptable and unacceptable content and advertisements. As of March 31, 2021, we had approximately 4,000 teammates who together moderated tens of millions of pieces of content each month. We are developing and enforcing Content Security policies in several areas, including intellectual property, job and commerce postings, objectionable material, and political advertising.

Highlights of our Content Security service offering include:

TaskUs Resiliency Studio: We view our employees who provide Content Security services as “Digital First Responders.” Most of the content our employees review is not offensive, but even constantly viewing misinformation or conspiracy theories can be challenging. To care for our employees’ well-being, we have developed the TaskUs Resiliency Studio, a clinician-led and evidence-based psychological health and safety program.

Global Policy Management: Our Content Security organization partners with our clients to apply best practices to policy development and distribution, product design, quality, and training. As a result of government regulations and cultural norms, major social networks must maintain increasingly distinct content policies in different geographies.

Tools and Innovation: The tools used by employees providing Content Security services have a significant impact on efficiency, accuracy and quality. We partner with our clients to customize these toolsets and have developed proprietary technology to improve our own productivity and accuracy.

Artificial Intelligence Operations

Intelligent applications based on Artificial Intelligence are core to the digital economy. AI applications are created by annotating datasets to train an algorithm in a process called Machine Learning. We first began supporting AI applications over a decade ago including next-generation product development efforts such as transcribing voicemail messages for visual voicemail solutions and manually scoring the sentiment of social media posts for social listening tools. Today, our services have increased in sophistication and complexity as AI applications have evolved.

Our Artificial Intelligence Operations solutions include:

Data Annotation: We build large sets of training data for our clients by annotating videos, photos, audio clips and text based on their policy specifications.

Computer Vision: Algorithms which allow a computer to “see” the world require millions of labeled images. For mission critical applications such as autonomous vehicles these images often must be labeled down to a single pixel.

Natural Language Processing: To understand the meaning of phrases, algorithms are trained with large sets of written text that has been annotated based on parts of speech, meaning and sentiment.



 

10


Table of Contents

Video Processing: Understanding videos requires the segmentation and recombination of two distinct training data sets—audio and visual. The audio file must be transcribed and annotated to enable Natural Language Processing and objects in the image files must be tagged to enable Computer Vision.

Sensor Processing: Refining algorithms which make decisions based on sensor data requires annotated sets of sensor data from sources such as the LiDAR systems of autonomous vehicles.

Delivery and Operations

TaskUs operations are designed to scale rapidly with perpetual experimentation and iteration and a devotion to data-driven decision making. Many of our clients have little to no outsourcing experience. Over 50 of our clients since 2017 turned to TaskUs to be their first outsourcer in our area of service. Given the rapid scale required to keep up with the growth of their businesses, they choose to outsource certain services. Unlike more mature buyers of outsourced services, our clients rarely deliver us a prescriptive playbook for how to run our operations. We understand their objectives and design the most efficient process to meet and exceed these goals. In our 2020 cNPS Survey, 76% of all respondents agreed or strongly agreed that their programs’ operational performance expectations are regularly met. To deliver to these standards we offer:

 

   

Subject Matter Expertise: We have “SME” teams in each of our primary services—Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and Artificial Intelligence Operations;

 

   

Project Management Organization: Our “PMO” is the linchpin between sales and operations to ensure client success;

 

   

Modern Service Excellence: We use real-time dashboards and KPI management to meet and exceed our clients’ expectations. Our process discipline has allowed us to achieve multiple certifications and compliance standards including SOC 2 Type 2, HIPAA and PCI;

 

   

Agile Automation: There are often massive opportunities to improve our efficiency and quality with our own technology. Our Digital Innovation team focuses on rapid prototyping using lightweight technical solutions like browser based extensions, robotic process automation, and productivity and workflow analytics; and

 

   

Data Science and Analytics: Our Business Intelligence teams apply data science to client data to drive insights back into our operations in a cycle of continuous improvement.

At the core of our operations are scaled teams of employees, our TaskUs teammates. These individuals ultimately determine the quality of service we provide our clients and, as such, we are obsessive about the standard of our frontline teammates and our team leaders, the first level of management. We have organized our global operating model around individual office locations, referred to as sites. These sites are run by Vice Presidents of Operations, who act as “Site CEOs.”

Our operations are supported by centralized shared services based in the Philippines and India. Each site has at least one leader on-site from each of our support functions, including Human Resources, Workforce Management and Information Technology. The combination of onsite leadership with scaled shared services allows us to support our Site CEO model in a cost effective manner and execute processes with the appropriate consistency globally while accounting for local nuance.

We leverage technology to deliver coaching, training, and support services at scale. Our proprietary coaching platform, Boost, is used daily by our frontline team leaders to coach their teammates and for our entire executive team to manage weekly one-to-ones and quarterly performance appraisals. Our learning-management-



 

11


Table of Contents

system, ACE, is used to enable self-paced client specific training and certification. Our Global Knowledge Support Center, Glowstick, is an employee engagement platform used to provide self service and support ticketing for all areas of our business.

Utilizing primarily offshore and near-shore markets is a central tenet of our service delivery strategy; 85% of our employees were located in these markets as of March 31, 2021. Since 96% of our revenue in 2020 was delivered from non-voice, digital channels or omni-channel services, we are particularly well positioned to leverage an off-shore / near-shore model.

As of March 31, 2021, we provided our services through a network of eighteen locations in eight countries and employed approximately 27,500 people worldwide.

LOGO

 

*

Headcount numbers are approximate

In addition to our on-site operations, we utilize an internally developed cloud-based platform, Cirrus, which enables our employees to deliver services remotely on behalf of our clients. Given the recent shift to work-from-home at TaskUs during COVID-19, we expect our Cirrus Work@Home platform to be a meaningful part of our future delivery model.

Culture

The number one reason job candidates choose one job over another is company culture—Korn Ferry.

We continually work on our company culture like it is a product we sell in the market, listening to our employees, similar to how we listen to our clients. We leverage this feedback to drive continuous improvement, conduct quality



 

12


Table of Contents

control to ensure global consistency, and award bonuses to our executives based on achieving their culture-related goals. Our primary culture-related goal metric is eNPS, the single most important barometer we use to measure employee engagement. Our executive team reviews the survey score and thousands of verbatim comments. We take the feedback and create specific and measurable goals we believe will impact parts of our culture.

Our ability to maintain high eNPS scores enables us to drive real business impact. We believe it drives improved attendance as our teammates show up on time and excited to work. We believe happy employees deliver better results and higher retention. The voluntary attrition rate for employees who were employed by TaskUs for more than 180 days was 14.9% for the year ended December 31, 2020. In 2020, 38% of our new hires came through referrals, which we believe yields higher quality candidates at a lower cost to recruit than candidates hired through traditional channels.

The culmination of our employee efforts drove our eNPS score of 72 in 2020 and 79% of respondents were promoters.

The differentiated culture we have created is validated by the following metrics, each as of March 2021:

LOGO

Our philosophy is simple: treat people well and they will deliver a better end customer experience which leads to happy clients and a thriving business.

Our Clients

As of December 31, 2020, we served over 100 clients, the majority of which are disruptive technology companies in attractive, high growth industry verticals, including social media, e-commerce, gaming, streaming media, food delivery and ride sharing, HiTech, FinTech and HealthTech. We work with a broad range of clients in different stages of their lifecycle, ranging from start-up companies to well-capitalized and established public companies with scaled operations. Our top ten and twenty clients accounted for 68% and 81% of our revenue for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, respectively. Our largest client, Facebook, generated 32% and 35% of our revenue for the fiscal years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019, respectively. Our second largest client, DoorDash, generated 12% and 11% of our revenue for the fiscal years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019, respectively.

Our Sponsor

Blackstone (NYSE: BX) is one of the world’s leading investment firms. Blackstone’s asset management businesses include investment vehicles focused on real estate, private equity, public debt and equity, growth



 

13


Table of Contents

equity, opportunistic, non-investment grade credit, real assets and secondary funds, all on a global basis. Through its different businesses, Blackstone had total assets under management of approximately $649 billion as of March 31, 2021.

After the completion of this offering, our Co-Founders and our Sponsor will be parties to a stockholders agreement described in “Certain Relationships and Related Person Transactions—Stockholders Agreement” and will beneficially own approximately 98.5% of the combined voting power of our Class A common stock and Class B common stock (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full). As a result, we will be a “controlled company” within the meaning of the Nasdaq corporate governance standards. Under these corporate governance standards, a company of which more than 50% of the voting power is beneficially owned by an individual, group or another company is a “controlled company” and may elect not to comply with certain corporate governance standards, including the requirements (1) that a majority of our board of directors consist of independent directors, (2) that our board of directors have a compensation committee that is comprised entirely of independent directors with a written charter addressing the committee’s purpose and responsibilities and (3) that our director nominations be made, or recommended to our full board of directors, by our independent directors or by a nominations committee that is comprised entirely of independent directors and that we adopt a written charter or board resolution addressing the nominations process. For at least some period following this offering, we intend to utilize certain of these exemptions. Accordingly, you will not have the same protections afforded to stockholders of companies that are subject to all of these corporate governance requirements. In the event that we cease to be a “controlled company” and our Class A common stock continues to be listed on Nasdaq, we will be required to comply with these provisions within the applicable transition periods.

Implications of Being an Emerging Growth Company

As a company with less than $1.07 billion in revenue during our most recently completed fiscal year as of the initial filing date of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part, we qualify as an “emerging growth company” as defined in Section 2(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “Securities Act”), as modified by the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012 (the “JOBS Act”). As an emerging growth company, we may take advantage of specified reduced disclosure and other requirements that are otherwise applicable generally to public companies that are not emerging growth companies. These provisions include:

 

   

presentation of only two years of audited financial statements and only two years of related management’s discussion and analysis of financial condition and results of operations in this prospectus;

 

   

reduced disclosure about our executive compensation arrangements;

 

   

no non-binding stockholder advisory votes on executive compensation or golden parachute arrangements;

 

   

exemption from compliance with the requirement of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board regarding communication of critical accounting matters in the auditor’s report in the financial statements; and

 

   

exemption from the auditor attestation requirement in the auditing assessment over internal control over financial reporting.

We may take advantage of these exemptions for up to five years or such earlier time that we are no longer an emerging growth company. We will cease to be an emerging growth company upon the earliest of: (1) the end



 

14


Table of Contents

of the fiscal year following the fifth anniversary of this offering; (2) the first fiscal year after our annual gross revenues are $1.07 billion or more; (3) the date on which we have, during the previous three-year period, issued more than $1.0 billion in non-convertible debt securities; or (4) the date on which we are deemed to be a “large accelerated filer” under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”). We have taken advantage of reduced disclosure regarding executive compensation arrangements and the presentation of certain historical financial information in this prospectus, and we may choose to take advantage of some but not all of these reduced disclosure obligations in future filings. If we do, the information that we provide stockholders may be different than you might get from other public companies in which you hold stock.

The JOBS Act permits an emerging growth company such as us to take advantage of an extended transition period to comply with new or revised accounting standards applicable to public companies. We have elected to use the extended transition period until we are no longer an emerging growth company or until we choose to affirmatively and irrevocably “opt out” of the extended transition period. As a result, our financial statements may not be comparable to companies that comply with new or revised accounting pronouncements applicable to public companies.

Summary Risk Factors

An investment in shares of our Class A common stock involves substantial risks and uncertainties that may materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations and cash flows. Some of the more significant challenges and risks relating to an investment in our Class A common stock include, among other things, the following:

 

   

Our business is dependent on key clients, and the loss of a key client could have an adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

 

   

Our contracts are typically one to three years in length with automatic renewal provisions, but certain contracts may provide for termination at the client’s convenience with advance notice and may or may not include penalties or required payments in the event the termination right is exercised. Our clients may terminate contracts before completion or choose not to renew contracts, and our clients may be unable or unwilling to pay for services we performed. A loss of business or non-payment from significant clients could materially affect our results of operations.

 

   

We may fail to cost-effectively acquire new, high-growth clients, which would adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

 

   

If we provide inadequate service or cause disruptions in our clients’ businesses or fail to comply with the quality standards required by our clients under our agreements, it could result in significant costs to us, the loss of our clients and damage to our corporate reputation.

 

   

Unauthorized or improper disclosure of personal or other sensitive information, or security breaches and incidents, whether inadvertent or purposeful, including as the result of a cyber-attack, could result in liability and harm our reputation, each of which could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

 

   

Content moderation is a large portion of our business. The long term impacts on the mental health and well-being of our employees doing this work are unknown. This work may lead to stress disorders and may create liabilities for us. This work is also subject to significant press and regulatory scrutiny. As a result, we may be subject to negative publicity or liability, or face difficulties retaining and recruiting employees, any of which could have an adverse effect on our reputation, business, financial condition and results of operations.



 

15


Table of Contents
   

Our failure to detect and deter criminal or fraudulent activities or other misconduct by our employees could result in loss of trust from our clients and negative publicity, which would have an adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

 

   

Global economic and political conditions, especially in the social media and meal delivery and transport industries from which we generate most of our revenue, could adversely affect our business, results of operations, financial condition and prospects.

 

   

Our business is heavily dependent upon our international operations, particularly in the Philippines and India, and any disruption to those operations would adversely affect us.

 

   

Our business is subject to a variety of U.S. and international laws and regulations, including those regarding privacy and data security, and we or our clients may be subject to regulations related to the handling and transfer of certain types of sensitive and confidential information. Any failure to comply with applicable privacy and data security laws and regulations could harm our business, results of operations and financial condition.

 

   

Our business depends in part on our capacity to invest in technology as it develops, and substantial increases in the costs of technology and telecommunications services or our inability to attract and retain the necessary technologists could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

 

   

Our results of operations and ability to grow could be materially affected if we cannot adapt our services and solutions to changes in technology and client expectations.

 

   

Fluctuations against the U.S. dollar in the local currencies in the countries in which we operate could have a material effect on our results of operations. Our business depends on a strong brand and corporate reputation, and if we are not able to maintain and enhance our brand, our ability to expand our client base will be impaired and our business and operating results will be adversely affected.

 

   

Competitive pricing pressure may reduce our revenue or gross profits and adversely affect our financial results.

 

   

The success of our business depends on our senior management and key employees.

 

   

Our management team has limited experience managing a public company.

 

   

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, including the resulting global economic uncertainty and measures taken in response to the pandemic, has adversely impacted our business, financial condition and results of operations, especially in the first half of 2020, and may continue to do so.

 

   

Our Sponsor and our Co-Founders control us and their interests may conflict with ours or yours in the future.

 

   

The dual class structure of our common stock will have the effect of concentrating voting control with those stockholders who held our common stock prior to the completion of this offering, and it may depress the trading price of our Class A common stock.

Please see “Risk Factors” for a discussion of these and other factors you should consider before making an investment in shares of our Class A common stock.

 

 

TaskUs, Inc. was incorporated in Delaware on July 27, 2018, under the name TU TopCo, Inc. On December 14, 2020, we changed our name to TaskUs, Inc. Our principal executive offices are located at 1650 Independence Drive, Suite 100, New Braunfels, Texas 78132 and our telephone number is (888) 400-8275.



 

16


Table of Contents

Recent Developments

Cash Dividend

On April 9, 2021, our board of directors declared a cash dividend in the aggregate amount of $50.0 million, or $5.45 per share (without giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock), to holders of our common stock (the “2021 Dividend”). The 2021 Dividend was paid on April 16, 2021 using available cash. See “Executive and Director Compensation—Narrative Disclosure to Summary Compensation Table—2021 Dividend.”

Amendment to Our 2019 Credit Agreement

On April 30, 2021, we entered into Amendment No. 1 to our 2019 Credit Agreement (as defined herein) with the existing lenders providing for $50.0 million incremental revolving credit commitments on the same terms as our existing revolving credit facility. See “Description of Certain Indebtedness—Senior Secured Credit Facilities.”



 

17


Table of Contents

The Offering

Share information presented below reflects a 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock to occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part and prior to the closing of this offering.

 

Class A common stock offered by TaskUs, Inc.

   5,553,154 shares.

Class A common stock offered by the selling stockholders

   7,646,846 shares.

Option to purchase additional shares from the selling stockholders

 

   The selling stockholders have granted the underwriters an option for a period of 30 days to purchase up to 1,980,000 additional shares of Class A common stock from the selling stockholders.

Class A common stock outstanding after giving effect to this offering

 

   13,200,000 shares (or 15,180,000 shares if the underwriters exercise in full their option to purchase additional shares of Class A common stock).

Class B common stock outstanding after giving effect to this offering

 

   84,090,174 shares (or 82,110,174 shares if the underwriters exercise in full their option to purchase additional shares of Class A common stock).

Total Class A and Class B common stock outstanding after giving effect to this offering

 

  

97,290,174 shares.

 

Use of proceeds

  

We estimate that the net proceeds to TaskUs, Inc. from this offering, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and before estimated offering expenses, will be approximately $120.7 million.

 

We intend to use the net proceeds received by us from this offering, together with cash on hand, to satisfy payments of approximately $127.4 million in respect of vested phantom shares, including $23.5 million in respect of vested phantom shares held by certain of our executive officers, that will become due upon the completion of this offering, based on an assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, including $10.0 million in deferred dividend payments in respect of such vested phantom shares. We intend to use the remainder of the net proceeds, if any, from this offering for general corporate purposes, which may include but are not limited to future acquisitions.

 

We will not receive any proceeds from the sale of shares of Class A common stock offered by the selling stockholders (including any sales pursuant to the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares from the selling stockholders).

Voting rights

   We have two classes of common stock: Class A common stock and Class B common stock. The rights of the holders of Class A common stock and


 

18


Table of Contents
  

Class B common stock are identical, except with respect to voting, transfer and conversion rights. Class A common stock is entitled to one vote per share and Class B common stock is entitled to ten votes per share.

 

Holders of our Class A common stock and Class B common stock will generally vote together as a single class, unless otherwise required by law or our amended and restated certificate of incorporation. Each share of our Class B common stock may be convertible into one share of our Class A common stock at any time and will convert automatically upon certain transfers and upon the earlier of (i) seven years from the filing and effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation in connection with this offering and (ii) (x) with respect to our Sponsor, the first date on which the aggregate number of shares of our Class B common stock held by our Sponsor ceases to represent at least 5% of the aggregate number of our outstanding shares of common stock and (y) with respect to each Co-Founder, the first date on which the aggregate number of shares of our Class B common stock held by such Co-Founder ceases to represent at least 5% of the aggregate number of our outstanding shares of common stock. The holders of our outstanding Class B common stock will hold 98.5% of the combined voting power of our outstanding capital stock following this offering (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full), with our directors, executive officers, and holders of 5% or more of our common stock and their respective affiliates holding 98.5% of the combined voting power in the aggregate (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full). These stockholders will have the ability to control the outcome of matters submitted to our stockholders for approval, including the election of our directors and the approval of any change of control transaction. See the sections titled “Principal and Selling Stockholders” and “Description of Capital Stock” for additional information.

Controlled company

   After the completion of this offering, our Sponsor and our Co-Founders will beneficially own approximately 98.5% of the combined voting power of our Class A common stock and Class B common stock (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full). As a result, we will be a “controlled company” under Nasdaq rules. As a controlled company, we qualify for, and intend to rely on, exemptions from certain corporate governance requirements of Nasdaq.

Dividend policy

   We have no current plans to pay dividends on our common stock following this offering. Any decision to declare and pay dividends in the future will be made at the sole discretion of our board of directors and will depend on, among other things, our results of operations, cash requirements, financial condition, contractual restrictions and other factors that our board of directors may deem relevant. Because we are a holding company and have no direct operations, we will only be able to pay dividends from funds we receive from our subsidiaries. In addition, our ability to pay dividends is limited by covenants in our existing indebtedness and may be limited by the agreements governing any indebtedness we or our subsidiaries may incur in the future. See “Dividend Policy.”


 

19


Table of Contents

Directed share program

   At our request, the underwriters have reserved for sale, at the initial public offering price, up to 5% of the Class A common stock being offered for sale, to certain individuals associated with the Company. We will offer these shares to the extent permitted under applicable regulations. Any directors and officers that buy shares of Class A common stock through the directed share program will be subject to a 180-day lock-up period with respect to such shares, which restriction may be waived with the prior written consent of the representatives of the underwriters. The number of shares of Class A common stock available for sale to the general public in this offering will be reduced to the extent that such persons purchase such reserved shares. Any reserved shares not purchased will be offered by the underwriters to the general public on the same terms as the other shares of Class A common stock. See “Underwriting (Conflicts of Interest).”

Risk factors

   See “Risk Factors” for a discussion of risks you should carefully consider before deciding to invest in our Class A common stock.

Conflicts of Interest

   Affiliates of Blackstone Securities Partners L.P. own in excess of 10% of our issued and outstanding common stock. Because Blackstone Securities Partners L.P. is an underwriter in this offering and its affiliates own in excess of 10% of our issued and outstanding Class A and Class B common stock, Blackstone Securities Partners L.P. is deemed to have a “conflict of interest” under Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”) Rule 5121. Accordingly, this offering is being made in compliance with the requirements of Rule 5121. Pursuant to that rule, the appointment of a “qualified independent underwriter” is not required in connection with this offering. In accordance with FINRA Rule 5121(c), no sales of the shares in this offering will be made to any discretionary account over which Blackstone Securities Partners L.P. exercises discretion without the prior specific written approval of the account holder.

Proposed Nasdaq trading symbol

   “TASK”

The number of shares of our Class A common stock and Class B common stock that will be outstanding after this offering is based on 9,173,702 shares of our common stock outstanding as of May 31, 2021 (prior to giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock), and reflects the 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock, the reclassification of all 91,737,020 outstanding shares of our common stock (after giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward split) into an equal number of shares of Class B common stock (in which all of our existing shareholders immediately prior to such reclassification will participate equally), which will occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part and prior to the closing of this offering (the “Class B Reclassification”), the subsequent conversion of 7,646,846 shares of Class B common stock into an equivalent number of shares of Class A common stock in connection with the sale of such shares by the selling stockholders in this offering and the issuance of 5,553,154 shares of Class A common stock in connection with the offer by us of such shares in this offering.

In this prospectus, unless otherwise indicated, the number of shares of Class A common stock and Class B common stock outstanding and the other information based thereon does not reflect:

 

   

the conversion of 1,980,000 shares of Class B common stock into an equal number of shares of Class A common stock upon exercise of the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares of common stock from the selling stockholders;



 

20


Table of Contents
   

7,597,730 shares of Class A common stock issuable upon the exercise of options to purchase share of our Class A common stock outstanding as of May 31, 2021, pursuant to the 2019 TaskUs, Inc. Stock Incentive Plan (the “2019 Stock Incentive Plan”); and

 

   

18,775,051 shares of Class A common stock that may be granted under the TaskUs, Inc. 2021 Omnibus Incentive Plan (the “Omnibus Incentive Plan”), which will become effective in connection with the completion of this offering (which number includes the Founder Awards and the IPO Awards (each as defined under “Executive and Director Compensation—IPO-Related Equity Grants”) and excludes any potential future increases pursuant to the terms of the Omnibus Incentive Plan). See “Executive and Director Compensation—Omnibus Incentive Plan” and “Executive and Director Compensation—IPO-Related Equity Grants”. The shares of Class A common stock that may be issued pursuant to the Founder Awards and the IPO Awards include:

 

   

2,528,622 shares of Class A common stock issuable in connection with the settlement of time-based restricted stock units (“RSUs”) that will be granted under our Omnibus Incentive Plan, which will become effective in connection with the completion of this offering to Mr. Maddock and certain other officers and employees. See “Executive and Director Compensation—IPO-Related Equity Grants”;

 

   

3,307,060 shares of Class A common stock issuable in connection with the settlement of performance-based restricted stock units (“PSUs”) that will be granted under our Omnibus Incentive Plan, which will become effective in connection with the completion of this offering to Mr. Maddock and certain other officers and employees. See “Executive and Director Compensation—IPO-Related Equity Grants”; and

 

   

1,565,398 shares of Class A common stock issuable upon the exercise of stock options that will be granted under our Omnibus Incentive Plan, which will become effective in connection with the completion of this offering to Mr. Maddock and certain other officers and employees, with an exercise price equal to the initial public offering price. See “Executive and Director Compensation—IPO-Related Equity Grants.”

In addition, unless indicated otherwise, all share information reflects a 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock, to occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part and prior to the closing of this offering. The share and per share information in the financial statements and the related notes thereto included elsewhere in this prospectus are presented on a historical basis only and therefore do not reflect the ten-for-one forward stock split of our common stock.



 

21


Table of Contents

Summary Historical Consolidated Financial and Other Data

The following tables present summary historical financial and other data for the periods and as of the dates indicated and should be read in conjunction with the “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” “Selected Historical Consolidated Financial Data” and the consolidated financial statements and notes thereto included elsewhere in this prospectus.

The summary historical consolidated financial information presented below for the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019 have been derived from our audited consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The summary historical consolidated financial information presented below for the period from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018 (Successor) and the period from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 (Predecessor) have been derived from our audited consolidated financial statements and related notes not included in this prospectus. The period from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018 (Successor) and the period from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 (Predecessor) are distinct reporting periods, and certain financial information for the Successor period is not comparable to the Predecessor period due to a new basis of accounting resulting from the application of acquisition accounting in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition. The summary historical consolidated financial information presented below for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 have been derived from our unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. Our unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements have been prepared on the same basis as our audited consolidated financial statements and, in the opinion of our management, reflect all normal recurring adjustments necessary for the fair statement of our consolidated results for these periods. The results for any interim period are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for the full year. Our historical results are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for any future period.

The unaudited combined financial information for Full Year 2018 represents the mathematical addition of our Predecessor’s results of operations from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018, and the Successor’s results of operations from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018. Each of the Predecessor and Successor periods from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 and October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018, respectively, have been audited and are consistent with GAAP. However, the presentation of unaudited combined financial information for Full Year 2018 is not consistent with GAAP or with the pro forma requirements of Article 11 of Regulation S-X, and may yield results that are not comparable on a period-to-period basis primarily due to (i) the impact of required purchase accounting adjustments and (ii) the new basis of accounting established in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition. Such results are not necessarily indicative of what the results for the combined period would have been had the Blackstone Acquisition not occurred.

 

    Successor          Predecessor              
(in thousands, except per share amounts)   Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018 through
December 31,
2018
         January 1
2018 through
September 30,
2018
    Full Year
2018
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2020
 
                                 (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Statement of Income Data:

                 

Service revenue

  $ 478,046     $ 359,681     $ 85,709         $ 168,501     $ 254,210     $ 152,871     $ 102,429  

Operating income

  $ 50,329     $ 36,862     $ 3,690         $ 26,323     $ 30,013     $ 22,401     $ 5,494  

Income before taxes

  $ 44,419     $ 29,529     $ 2,508         $ 24,142     $ 26,650     $ 20,066     $ 1,854  

Net income (loss)

  $ 34,533     $ 33,940     $ (871       $ 33,094     $ 32,223     $ 16,507     $ 1,515  

Net income (loss) per common share, basic and diluted(1)

  $ 3.76     $ 3.70     $ (0.09       $ 3.02     $ 3.06     $ 1.80     $ 0.17  

Pro forma net income (loss) per common share, basic and diluted (unaudited)(2)

  $ 0.38     $ 0.37     $ (0.01           $ 0.18     $ 0.02  

 

(1)

Presented on a historical basis without giving effect to 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock to occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement. See pro forma information below for per share information giving effect to the forward stock split.

(2)

The unaudited pro forma net income (loss) per common share, basic and diluted, is based on our historical consolidated statements of income after giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock, which will occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement.



 

22


Table of Contents
     Successor         
(in thousands, except per share amounts)    December 31,
2020
     December 31,
2019
     December 31,
2018
     March 31,
2021
 
                          (unaudited)  

Balance Sheet Data:

           

Cash

   $ 107,728      $ 37,541      $ 25,281      $ 135,493  

Total assets

   $ 707,506      $ 610,675      $ 585,380      $ 731,645  

Current portion of debt

   $ 45,984      $ 2,431      $ 450      $ 47,296  

Long-term debt

   $ 198,768      $ 204,874      $ 82,650      $ 196,257  

Distributions paid per common share

   $ —        $ 14.72      $ —        $ —    

 

     Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    Full Year
2018
 

Key Operational Metrics:

      

Headcount (approx. at period end)(1)

     23,600       18,400       13,800  

Net revenue retention rate(2)

     117     139     121

 

(1)

“Headcount” refers to TaskUs employees as of the end of a given measurement period.

(2)

“Net revenue retention rate” is an important metric we calculate annually to measure the retention and growth in the use of our services by our existing clients. Our net revenue retention rate as of a given fiscal year is calculated using a measurement period consisting of the two consecutive fiscal years ending with and including the most recent applicable fiscal year. Next, we define our “base cohort” as the population of clients that were using our services during the entire 12-month period of the first year of the measurement period. Net revenue retention rate is calculated as the quotient obtained by dividing (a) the revenue generated by the base cohort in the second year of measurement by (b) the revenue generated by the base cohort in the first year of measurement. The decline in the net revenue retention rate for the year ended December 31, 2020 as compared to the previous year was primarily driven by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic due to the reduction in volumes for certain clients in the ride sharing and self-driving autonomous vehicle markets who experienced a decline in their end customer volumes, which were significantly impacted by the lockdown restrictions globally. Normalizing for the decline in volume from the ride sharing and self-driving autonomous vehicle markets, net revenue retention rate in 2020 would have been approximately 126%. We expect the uncertainty related to these markets to continue throughout the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, the net revenue retention rate for the year ended December 31, 2019 reflected the rapid growth in revenue attributable to our largest client during the year, as compared to more steady state year over year revenue growth for our largest client for the year ended December 31, 2020, contributing to the remainder of the change in the net revenue retention rate.

 

    Successor          Predecessor        
(in thousands, except margin amounts)   Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018 through
December 31,
2018
         January 1
2018 through
September 30,
2018
    Full Year
2018
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2020
 
                                 (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Non-GAAP Financial Measures:

                 

Adjusted Net Income(1)

  $ 69,364     $ 52,975     $ 9,797         $ 22,591     $ 32,388     $ 28,198     $ 10,163  

Net Income (Loss) Margin

    7.2     9.4     (1.0 )%          19.6     12.7     10.8     1.5

Adjusted Net Income Margin(1)

    14.5     14.7     11.4         13.4     12.7     18.4     9.9

EBITDA(2)

  $ 90,903     $ 72,056     $ 12,400         $ 33,236     $ 45,636     $ 32,562     $ 13,523  

Adjusted EBITDA(2)

  $ 106,887     $ 74,239     $ 18,356         $ 38,594     $ 56,950     $ 39,541     $ 17,459  

Adjusted EBITDA Margin(2)

    22.4     20.6     21.4         22.9     22.4     25.9     17.0

 

(1)

Adjusted Net Income is a non-GAAP profitability measure that represents net income or loss for the period before the impact of amortization of intangible assets and certain items that are considered to hinder comparison of the performance of our businesses on a period-over-period basis or with other businesses. During the periods presented, we exclude from Adjusted Net Income offering costs, transaction related costs associated with the Blackstone Acquisition and the tax benefit associated with certain of such costs, the effect of foreign currency gains and losses, losses on disposals of assets, COVID-19 related expenses, severance costs, lease termination costs, natural disaster costs and contingent consideration, which include costs that are required to be expensed in accordance with GAAP, and non-recurring expenses incurred in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic. Our management believes that the inclusion of supplementary adjustments to net income (loss) applied in presenting Adjusted Net Income are appropriate to provide additional information to investors about certain material non-cash items and about unusual items that we do not expect to continue at the same level in the future.



 

23


Table of Contents

The following table reconciles net income (loss), the most directly comparable GAAP measure, to Adjusted Net Income:

 

    Successor           Predecessor              
(in thousands, except margin amounts)   Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018 through
December 31,
2018
          January 1
2018 through
September 30,
2018
    Full Year
2018
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2020
 
                                  (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Net income (loss)

  $ 34,533     $ 33,940     $ (871       $ 33,094     $ 32,223     $ 16,507     $ 1,515  

Amortization of intangible assets

    18,847       18,847       4,712           —         4,712       4,712       4,712  

Offering costs(a)

    896       —         —             —         —         3,329       —    

Transaction related costs(b)

    —         —         5,769           3,685       9,454       —         —    

Foreign currency (gains) losses(c)

    (1,511     (2,039     (395         1,680       1,285       787       1,404  

Loss (gain) on disposal of assets(d)

    1,116       2,227       582           (7     575       27       (5

Tax benefit from transaction related costs(e)

    —         —         —             (15,861     (15,861     —         —    

COVID-19 related expenses(f)

    7,541       —         —             —         —         2,394       2,439  

Severance costs(g)

    2,557       —         —             —         —         —         98  

Lease termination costs(h)

    1,815       —         —             —         —         —         —    

Natural disaster costs (i)

    —         —         —             —         —         442       —    

Contingent consideration(j)

    3,570       —         —             —         —         —         —    
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted Net Income

  $ 69,364     $ 52,975     $ 9,797         $ 22,591     $ 32,388     $ 28,198     $ 10,163  
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Net Income (Loss) Margin(k)

    7.2     9.4     (1.0 )%          19.6     12.7     10.8     1.5
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted Net Income Margin(k)

    14.5     14.7     11.4         13.4     12.7     18.4     9.9
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

  (a)

Represents one-time professional service fees related to the preparation for a potential initial public offering that have been expensed during the period.

  (b)

Transaction related costs include professional services fees totaling $9.2 million and compensation expense for bonuses paid to certain employees for services rendered in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition totaling $0.3 million.

  (c)

Realized and unrealized foreign currency gains and losses include the effect of fair market value changes of forward contracts and remeasurement of U.S. dollar-denominated accounts to foreign currency.

  (d)

Gain and loss on disposal of assets mainly resulted from the writeoff of leasehold improvements associated with the termination of certain of our real estate leases during the year ended December 31, 2020 and moving to permanent locations and consolidation of sites in the United States during the year ended December 31, 2019.

  (e)

Tax benefit recognized for transaction related costs deducted for tax purposes but not attributable to either the Predecessor or Successor period and therefore expense recognized “on the line.”

  (f)

Represents incremental expenses incurred that relate to the transition to and operational enablement of a virtual operating model and incentive and leave pay granted to employees that are directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  (g)

Represents severance payments as a result of certain cost optimization measures we undertook during the year.

  (h)

Represents one-time costs associated with the termination of lease agreements for two of our U.S. facilities attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  (i)

Represents one-time costs associated with emergency housing, transportation costs and bonuses for our employees in connection with the severe winter storm in Texas in February 2021.

  (j)

Represents non-recurring payments that are due to the sellers in the Blackstone Acquisition for certain tax benefits realized as a result of the net operating loss (“NOL”) carrybacks permitted as a result of the CARES Act (as defined in “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—COVID-19—Cash and Cost Management”).

  (k)

Net Income (Loss) Margin represents net income divided by service revenue and Adjusted Net Income Margin represents Adjusted Net Income divided by service revenue.

 

(2)

EBITDA is a non-GAAP profitability measure that represents net income or loss for the period before the impact of the benefit from or provision for income taxes, financing expenses, depreciation, and amortization of intangible assets. EBITDA eliminates potential differences in performance caused by variations in capital structures (affecting financing expenses), tax positions (such as the availability of net operating losses against which to relieve taxable profits), the cost and age of tangible assets (affecting relative depreciation expense) and the extent to which intangible assets are identifiable (affecting relative amortization expense).

 

 

Adjusted EBITDA is a non-GAAP profitability measure that represents EBITDA before certain items that are considered to hinder comparison of the performance of our businesses on a period-over-period basis or with other businesses. During the periods presented, we exclude from Adjusted EBITDA offering costs, transaction related costs associated with the Blackstone Acquisition, the effect of foreign currency gains and losses, losses on disposals of assets, accelerated expense for certain unamortized debt financing costs related to the settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility, COVID-19 related expenses, severance costs, lease termination costs, natural disaster costs and contingent consideration, which include costs that are required to be expensed in accordance with GAAP, and non-recurring expenses incurred in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic. Our management believes that the inclusion of supplementary adjustments to EBITDA applied in presenting Adjusted EBITDA are appropriate to provide additional information to investors about certain material non-cash items and about unusual items that we do not expect to continue at the same level in the future.



 

24


Table of Contents

The following table reconciles net income (loss), the most directly comparable GAAP measure, to EBITDA and Adjusted EBITDA:

 

    Successor           Predecessor              
(in thousands, except margin amounts)   Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018 through
December 31,
2018
          January 1
2018 through
September 30,
2018
    Full Year
2018
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended

March 31,
2020
 
                                  (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Net income (loss)

  $ 34,533     $ 33,940     $ (871       $ 33,094     $ 32,223     $ 16,507     $ 1,515  

Provision for (benefit from) income taxes

    9,886       (4,411     3,379           (8,952     (5,573     3,559       339  

Financing expenses(a)

    7,482       7,351       1,527           511       2,038       1,581       2,243  

Depreciation

    20,155       16,329       3,653           8,583       12,236       6,203       4,714  

Amortization of intangible assets

    18,847       18,847       4,712           —         4,712       4,712       4,712  
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

EBITDA

    90,903       72,056       12,400           33,236       45,636       32,562       13,523  
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Offering costs(b)

    896       —         —             —         —         3,329       —    

Transaction related costs(c)

    —         —         5,769           3,685       9,454       —         —    

Foreign currency (gains) losses(d)

    (1,511     (2,039     (395         1,680       1,285       787       1,404  

Loss (gain) on disposal of assets(e)

    1,116       2,227       582           (7     575       27       (5

Settlement of 2018 Credit Facility(f)

    —         1,995       —             —         —         —         —    

COVID-19 related expenses(g)

    7,541       —         —             —         —         2,394       2,439  

Severance costs(h)

    2,557       —         —             —         —         —         98  

Lease termination costs(i)

    1,815       —         —             —         —         —         —    

Natural disaster costs(j)

    —         —         —             —         —         442       —    

Contingent consideration(k)

    3,570       —         —             —         —         —         —    
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted EBITDA

  $ 106,887     $ 74,239     $ 18,356         $ 38,594     $ 56,950     $ 39,541     $ 17,459  
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Net Income (Loss) Margin(l)

    7.2     9.4     (1.0 )%          19.6     12.7     10.8     1.5
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted EBITDA Margin(l)

    22.4     20.6     21.4         22.9     22.4     25.9     17.0
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

(a)

Financing expenses include interest expense, commitment fees on undrawn amounts, and debt financing costs related to our 2018 Credit Facility and 2019 Credit Facilities. For the year ended December 31, 2019, we accelerated expense recognition for certain debt financing costs upon settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility, which were included in financing expenses in our consolidated statements of income, but which have been separately included as a non-recurring adjustment to arrive at Adjusted EBITDA.

(b)

Represents one-time professional service fees related to the preparation for a potential initial public offering that have been expensed during the period.

(c)

Transaction related costs include professional services fees totaling $9.2 million and compensation expense for bonuses paid to certain employees for services rendered in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition totaling $0.3 million.

(d)

Realized and unrealized foreign currency gains and losses include the effect of fair market value changes of forward contracts and remeasurement of U.S. dollar-denominated accounts to foreign currency.

(e)

Gain and loss on disposal of assets mainly resulted from the writeoff of leasehold improvements associated with the termination of certain of our real estate leases during the year ended December 31, 2020 and moving to permanent locations and consolidation of sites in the United States during the year ended December 31, 2019.

(f)

Debt financing costs for which expense was accelerated upon settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility.

(g)

Represents incremental expenses incurred that relate to the transition to and operational enablement of a virtual operating model and incentive and leave pay granted to employees that are directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

(h)

Represents severance payments as a result of certain cost optimization measures we undertook during the year.

(i)

Represents one-time costs associated with the termination of lease agreements for two of our U.S. facilities attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

(j)

Represents one-time costs associated with emergency housing, transportation costs and bonuses for our employees in connection with the severe winter storm in Texas in February 2021.

(k)

Represents non-recurring payments that are due to the sellers in the Blackstone Acquisition for certain tax benefits realized as a result of the NOL carrybacks permitted as a result of the CARES Act.

(l)

Net Income (Loss) Margin represents net income divided by service revenue and Adjusted EBITDA Margin represents Adjusted EBITDA divided by service revenue.



 

25


Table of Contents

RISK FACTORS

An investment in shares of our Class A common stock involves a high degree of risk. You should carefully consider the following information about these risks, together with the other information contained in this prospectus, before investing in shares of our Class A common stock. Any of the following risks could have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results or operations or prospects and could cause the trading price of our Class A common stock to decline, which would cause you to lose all or part of your investment. Our business, financial condition, results of operations or prospects could also be harmed by risks and uncertainties not currently known to us or that we currently do not believe are material.

Risks Related to Our Business and Industry

Our business is dependent on key clients, and the loss of a key client could have an adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

We derive a substantial portion of our revenue from a few key clients who generally retain us across multiple service offerings. Our top five clients accounted for 56% of our revenue for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020. Our top client accounted for an aggregate of 32% of our revenue for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, across multiple service offerings. The loss of all or a portion of our business with, or the failure to retain a significant amount of business with, any of our key clients could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, our ability to maintain, increase and collect revenue from our top clients depends in part on the financial condition of those clients. Further, our reliance on any individual client for a significant portion of our revenue may give that client a certain degree of pricing leverage against us when negotiating contracts and terms of service and solutions.

Our contracts are typically one to three years in length with automatic renewal provisions, but certain contracts may provide for termination at the client’s convenience with advance notice and may or may not include penalties or required payments in the event the termination right is exercised. Our clients may terminate contracts before completion or choose not to renew contracts, and our clients may be unable or unwilling to pay for services we performed. A loss of business or non-payment from significant clients could materially affect our results of operations.

Our ability to maintain continuing relationships with our major clients and successfully obtain payment for our services and solutions is essential to the growth and profitability of our business. We enter into contractual arrangements, typically from one to three years in length, with our clients to help manage pricing or counter pricing pressure. However, the volume of work performed for any specific client is likely to vary from year to year, especially since we generally are not our clients’ exclusive outsourcing provider and we generally do not have long-term commitments from clients to purchase our services and solutions. Some of our service agreements restrict our ability to perform similar services, either generally or in certain sites, for certain of our clients’ competitors under specific circumstances. We may in the future enter into additional agreements with clients that restrict our ability to accept assignments from, or render similar services to, those clients’ customers, require us to obtain our clients’ prior written consent to provide services to their customers or restrict our ability to compete with our clients, or bid for or accept any assignment for which those clients are bidding or negotiating.

We may also fail to adequately or accurately assess the creditworthiness of our clients. Our clients’ ability to terminate engagements with or without cause, including for convenience, or opt for month to month contracts and our clients’ inability or unwillingness to pay for services we have performed makes our future revenues and profitability uncertain.

In addition, the services and solutions we provide to our clients, and the revenue and income from those services and solutions, may decline or vary as the type and quantity of services and solutions we provide changes

 

26


Table of Contents

over time. In order to successfully perform and market our services and solutions, we must establish and maintain multi-year close relationships with our clients and develop a thorough understanding of their businesses. Our ability to maintain these close relationships is essential to the growth and profitability of our business. If we fail to maintain these relationships and successfully obtain new engagements from our existing clients, we may not achieve our revenue growth and other financial goals.

There are a number of factors relating to our clients that are outside of our control, which have in some cases led them to terminate or not renew a contract or project with us, or be unable to pay us, including:

 

   

financial difficulties;

 

   

a demand for price reductions by that client;

 

   

corporate restructuring, or mergers and acquisitions activity;

 

   

our inability to complete our contractual commitments and bill and collect our contracted revenues;

 

   

change in strategic priorities or economic conditions, resulting in elimination of the impetus for the project or a reduced level of technology related spending;

 

   

change in outsourcing strategy resulting in moving more work to the client’s in-house technology departments or to our competitors;

 

   

government regulation that affects our clients’ business;

 

   

replacement of existing software with packaged software supported by licensors; and

 

   

uncertainty and disruption to the global markets including due to public health pandemics, such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Termination or non-renewal of a client contract could cause us to experience a higher than expected number of unassigned employees and thus compress our margins until we are able to reallocate our headcount. Clients that delay payment, request modifications to their payment arrangements, or fail to meet their payment obligations to us could increase our cash collection time or cause us to incur bad debt expense. The loss of any of our major clients or a significant decrease in the volume of work they outsource to us or the price they are willing or able to pay us, if not replaced by new service engagements and revenue, could materially adversely affect our revenues and results of operations.

We may fail to cost-effectively acquire new, high-growth clients, which would adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our continued growth depends on our ability to cost-effectively acquire new clients, particularly high-growth companies where there is a significant opportunity to expand our relationship in subsequent periods. Our ability to acquire new clients, in turn, depends on our ability to attract, train, retain and motivate sales and marketing personnel; our ability to remain competitive in our industry; our ability to anticipate and address the technological and geographic needs of our clients; and our ability to foster awareness of our services and our brand, among other factors. In addition, our ability to attract new clients in new industry verticals, new geographies and with respect to new services or solutions will depend on our ability to effectively train our sales and marketing personnel and develop effective strategies to communicate the value of our services to decision-makers at prospective clients in those industries and geographies. Our clients operate in highly competitive industries that are subject to constant change and disruption. To the extent that our clients do not succeed, we will need to identify and attract new clients that we believe present opportunities for growth and expansion with TaskUs. We cannot guarantee that we will continue to identify or attract new clients, including high-growth, brand-defining consumer technology companies.

Even when we do attract new clients, such new client wins may not result in significant revenue. Some clients start their TaskUs relationship with a relatively small engagement, and there can be no assurance that we

 

27


Table of Contents

will be able to expand the relationship or that the client will not terminate. Accordingly, net revenue retention, win rate and new client wins should not be viewed as leading indicators of our revenue. In addition, a significant portion of the revenue we recognize in each period is derived from agreements entered into in prior periods. Consequently, a decline in sales to new clients or a decline in renewals or upsells with existing clients in any one period may not be immediately reflected in our results of operations for such period, but could be reflected in future periods.

If we provide inadequate service or cause disruptions in our clients’ businesses or fail to comply with the quality standards required by our clients under our agreements, it could result in significant costs to us, the loss of our clients and damage to our corporate reputation.

Any defects or errors or failure to meet clients’ expectations in the performance of our contracts could result in claims for substantial damages against us. Our contracts generally limit our liability for damages that arise from negligent acts, errors, mistakes or omissions in rendering services to our clients. However, we cannot be sure that these contractual provisions will protect us from liability for damages in the event we are sued. In some circumstances, we have agreed to high liability limitations or unlimited liability for some claims, such as intellectual property infringement or a data security breach. Certain liabilities, such as claims of third parties for intellectual property infringement and breaches of data protection and security requirements, for which we may be required to indemnify our clients, could be substantial. The successful assertion of one or more large claims against us in amounts greater than those covered by our current insurance policies could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations. Even if such assertions against us are unsuccessful, we may incur reputational harm and substantial legal fees. In addition, a failure or inability to meet a contractual requirement could seriously damage our reputation and limit our ability to attract new business.

In certain instances, we guarantee clients that we will launch a campaign by a scheduled date or that we will maintain certain service levels. We are generally not subject to monetary penalties for failing to complete projects by the scheduled date, but may suffer reputational harm and loss of future business if we do not meet our contractual commitments. In addition, if a project experiences a performance problem, we may not be able to recover the additional costs we will incur, which could exceed revenue realized from a project. Under our managed service contracts, we may be required to pay liquidated damages if we are unable to maintain agreed-upon service levels.

In addition, many of our client contracts contain service level and performance requirements, including requirements relating to the quality of our solutions. Failure to meet service requirements or real or perceived errors made by our employees in the course of delivering our solutions could result in a reduction of revenue, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. In addition, many of our services and solutions, such as Content Security, require our employees to make judgments that may be subject to negative publicity or otherwise be scrutinized in hindsight, and in some cases our clients have sought to hold us responsible for or distance themselves from real or perceived errors of judgment.

Unauthorized or improper disclosure of personal or other sensitive information, or security breaches and incidents, whether inadvertent or purposeful, including as the result of a cyber-attack, could result in liability and harm our reputation, each of which could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Our business depends significantly upon our technology infrastructure, data, equipment, and systems. Our clients also typically provide data and systems that our employees use to provide services to those clients. Internal or external attacks on either our or our clients’ technology infrastructure, data, equipment, or systems could disrupt the normal operations of our and our clients’ businesses, including by impeding our ability to provide critical solutions to our clients. In addition, in the ordinary course of our business we collect, use, store, process, and transmit information about our employees, our clients and customers of our clients, including

 

28


Table of Contents

personal information and protected health information. While we believe we take reasonable measures to protect the security of, and against unauthorized or other improper access to, our technology infrastructure, data, equipment, and systems, including with respect to personal, protected health, and proprietary information, it is possible that our security controls and practices may not prevent unauthorized or other improper access to our technology infrastructure, data, equipment, or systems, or the disclosure of personal, protected health or proprietary information. In addition, we rely on systems provided by third parties, which have in the past suffered and may also in the future suffer security breaches or incidents. Such unauthorized or other improper access, disclosures, security breaches or incidents may be inadvertent, or may come about due to intentional misconduct or other malfeasance or by human error or technical malfunctions, including those caused by hackers, employees, contractors, or vendors.

Cybersecurity threats and attacks may take on a variety of forms, ranging from inadvertent disclosures or acts by employees to purposeful attacks by individuals and groups of hackers and even sophisticated organizations, including state-sponsored actors. Cybersecurity risks may result from viruses, worms, and other malicious software programs, including phishing attacks, to hacking or other significant security incidents (e.g., ransomware attacks) targeted against information technology infrastructure and systems, any of which could result in (i) disclosure, unauthorized access to, or corruption of data, including personal information, confidential information and proprietary information, (ii) defective products, including as a result of system and production downtimes, and (iii) interruptions in the ability to operate our business. Any of the foregoing could subject us to liability or damage our reputation. In addition, as the techniques used to obtain unauthorized access or sabotage systems change frequently and may not be identified until they are first launched against a target, despite our efforts to secure our technology infrastructure, data, equipment, and systems, we may be unable to anticipate all attacks or to implement adequate preventative measures against them.

Any unauthorized access, acquisition, use, or destruction of data we collect, store, process or transmit, the unavailability of such data, or other disruptions of our ability to provide services and solutions to our clients, regardless of whether it originates or occurs on our systems or those of third party service providers or our clients, could expose us to significant liability under our contracts, as well as to regulatory actions, litigation, investigations, remediation obligations, damage to our reputation and brand, supplemental disclosure obligations, loss of client, customer, consumer, and partner confidence in the security of our applications, impairment to our business, and corresponding fees, costs, expenses, loss of revenues, and other potential liabilities as well as increased costs or loss of revenue or other harm to our business. In addition, if a high profile security breach occurs within our industry, our clients and potential clients may lose trust in the security of our systems and information even if we are not directly affected.

In addition, as we continue to evaluate new solutions and services for our clients, these new solutions or services, or the third-party components we use to provide such solutions, may contain or introduce cybersecurity threats or vulnerabilities to our clients’ information technology networks, either intentionally or unintentionally. Our clients may maintain their own proprietary, sensitive, regulated or confidential information that could be compromised in a cybersecurity attack or incident, or their systems may be disabled or disrupted as a result of such an attack or incident. Our clients, regulators, or other third parties may attempt to hold us liable, through contractual indemnification clauses or directly, for any such losses or damages resulting from such an attack.

Content moderation is a large portion of our business. The long term impacts on the mental health and well-being of our employees doing this work are unknown. This work may lead to stress disorders and may create liabilities for us. This work is also subject to significant press and regulatory scrutiny. As a result, we may be subject to negative publicity or liability, or face difficulties retaining and recruiting employees, any of which could have an adverse effect on our reputation, business, financial condition and results of operations.

Some of our clients maintain platforms and websites that permit users to post content that is made generally available on these platforms and websites. These posts sometimes contain content that is defamatory, pornographic, hateful, violent, racist, scandalous, obscene, offensive, objectionable, or illegal, or that otherwise violates the policies of our clients (“Prohibited Content”). In addition to Prohibited Content, employees review posts that are

 

29


Table of Contents

political in nature, which may constitute objectionable content for some employees. Some of our employees work as content moderators on behalf of our clients, screening posts for Prohibited Content. While we believe that content moderation is a vital part of maintaining an open and safe internet for everyone, employees exposed to Prohibited Content on a regular basis are more likely to develop mental health issues, such as stress disorders, or experience other negative health impacts, and are more likely to resign from their employment. In addition, employers of content moderators, including our company, have been subject to significant negative media coverage and other public relations challenges, as well as legal actions by or on behalf of content moderators claiming significant damages for mental health issues allegedly developed while on the job. Additionally, content moderation is subject to regulation in certain jurisdictions and we may receive inquiries from government authorities and regulators regarding our compliance with laws and regulations, many of which are evolving and subject to interpretation.

We are dedicated to improving the efficiency and accuracy of content moderation while also mitigating its impact on the health and well-being of our content moderator employees. Despite these efforts, we could be subject to claims made by such employees. These claims could lead to liability and negative publicity, harm our reputation, and impact our ability to retain or recruit employees to work as content moderators. For example, we may be required under applicable law to provide accommodations for employees who experience or who assert they are experiencing such mental health consequences. These accommodations could result in increased costs and reductions in the availability of employees who can perform content moderation work for our clients. Our content moderation employees may also make claims under workers’ compensation programs or other public or private insurance programs in connection with their employment or applicable labor or other laws. Any such employee claims or demands could result in increased costs, and could lead us to limit our content moderation business entirely, any of which would adversely impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.

In addition to employee-related controversies surrounding content moderation, companies that are engaged in content moderation, including certain of our clients, are under increasing scrutiny by both the public and lawmakers to be more transparent about how content moderation decisions are made and about the guidelines they create. We also face scrutiny for our application of our client guidelines. Our content moderation employees may erroneously or deliberately make content moderation decisions, many of which may be subjective in nature, that are inconsistent with client guidelines, which could result in a failure to meet our clients’ expectations or adverse publicity, either of which could impair our reputation and our ability to retain existing clients or attract new clients or expose us to liability to users of client platforms. In addition, the content that our content moderation employees analyze is selected for review by our clients’ systems and moderated by our employees based on our clients’ policies and rules, and the tools used by our clients to identify content may fail to identify content that violates relevant content policy or community guidelines or, in certain jurisdictions, legal requirements. Although the methods employed to select content for review are not within the scope of the services we provide, the failure of objectionable content to be appropriately moderated on our clients’ platforms, for whatever reason, could adversely impact our reputation for content moderation service delivery and our ability to attract and retain clients.

Our business, and those of our clients, are subject to laws related to content moderation in some jurisdictions. In the United States, the Communications Decency Act (“CDA”) Section 230 provides protection to those who provide “interactive computer services” (e.g., websites, social media platforms) from being liable for the speech of their users (with certain exceptions). The law also shields interactive computer services from civil liability for a good faith action voluntarily taken to restrict access to or availability of content that the provider or user considers to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable, whether or not such material is constitutionally protected. The content moderation that is both required and permitted by CDA Section 230 is currently a topic of significant debate in the United States, with some taking the position that interactive computer services are using CDA Section 230 to censor speech, and others taking the position that not enough action is being taken to remove Prohibited Content. As a result of our content moderation business, we risk being part of this ongoing controversy, which could result in negative publicity and harm our ability to retain and attract clients, and negatively impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Furthermore, changes to CDA Section 230 are currently being debated by lawmakers, but the final content of these changes, if any, are currently unknown. In October of 2020, the chair of the Federal Communications

 

30


Table of Contents

Commission (“FCC”) announced that the FCC will be drafting regulations to clarify the meaning of CDA Section 230. Changes to CDA Section 230 remain uncertain, and could have a significant impact on our business, including by requiring us to comply with additional regulations, subjecting our business, and the businesses of our clients, to increased liability for content moderation activities, significantly increasing our expenses to comply with applicable laws and regulations, or shrinking the market for content moderation, any of which would adversely impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our failure to detect and deter criminal or fraudulent activities or other misconduct by our employees could result in loss of trust from our clients and negative publicity, which would have an adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

Because we have access to our clients’ sensitive and confidential information in the ordinary course of our business, our employees have engaged and could engage in criminal, fraudulent or other conduct prohibited by applicable law, client contracts or internal policy. The remote work environment implemented in our response to the COVID-19 pandemic and our inability to maintain access controls on physical space has reduced our ability to monitor employee conduct and has elevated the risk of our employees engaging in such conduct undetected by us. For example, employees may exfiltrate data from client systems by using cameras to photograph their computer screens or provide unauthorized users with access to our and clients’ computer systems. Since transitioning to a remote work environment, we have detected increased incidence of attempted employee fraud. For example, certain of our employees have abused their access to client systems to confer benefits, such as credits for our clients’ services, on themselves or their associates, improperly collected sensitive customer data such as credit card or other payment information and engaged in other malfeasance, which has in certain cases resulted in harm to our relationships with impacted clients. Although we terminate employees when our investigations establish misconduct and have implemented measures designed to identify and deter such misconduct, such as fraud prevention training, there can be no assurance that such measures will prevent or detect further employee misconduct. If our employees use their access to our and our clients’ systems as a conduit for criminal activity or other misconduct, our clients and their customers may not consider our services and solutions safe and trustworthy, and we could receive negative press coverage or other public attention as a result. Such loss of trust and negative publicity could cause our existing clients to terminate or reduce the scope of their dealings with us and harm our ability to attract new clients, which would have an adverse effect on our business and results of operations. Further, we may be subject to claims of liability by our clients or their customers based on the misconduct or malfeasance of our employees, and our insurance policies may not cover all potential claims to which we are exposed or indemnify us for all liability.

Global economic and political conditions, especially in the social media and meal delivery and transport industries from which we generate most of our revenue, could adversely affect our business, results of operations, financial condition and prospects.

Our results of operations may vary based on the impact of changes in the global economy and political environment on us and our clients. While it is often difficult to predict the impact of general economic conditions on our business, unfavorable economic conditions, such as those that occurred during the global financial crisis and economic downturn that began in 2008, would adversely affect the demand for some of our clients’ products and services and, in turn, could cause a decline in the demand for our services and solutions and materially adversely affect our revenues, financial condition and results of operations. We derive a significant portion of our revenues from high-growth consumer technology companies located in the United States. In particular, a substantial portion of our clients are concentrated in the social media, meal delivery and transport industries. The transportation, hospitality, entertainment, e-commerce and retail industries are particularly sensitive to the economic environment, and tend to decline during general economic downturns. Some of these industries and some of our clients within these industries have been particularly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Our business growth largely depends on continued demand for our services and solutions from clients in these industries and other industries that we may target in the future, as well as on trends in these industries to purchase such services and solutions or to move such services and solutions in-house.

 

31


Table of Contents

In addition, as many of our clients are venture-backed technology companies that have not yet attained profitability, our clients may be particularly susceptible to economic downturns, especially if economic or financial conditions impair their ability to access continued funding. If the U.S. economy further weakens or slows, or a negative or an uncertain political climate persists, pricing for our services and solutions may be depressed and our clients may reduce or postpone their spending significantly, which may, in turn, lower the demand for our services and solutions and negatively affect our revenues and profitability. Additionally, several of our clients, particularly in the transportation, hospitality, entertainment, e-commerce, and retail industries, have experienced substantial price competition. As a result, we face increasing price pressure from such clients, which, if continued, would negatively affect our operating and financial performance. For these reasons, among others, the occurrence of unfavorable economic and political conditions could adversely affect our business, results of operations, financial condition and prospects.

Our business is heavily dependent upon our international operations, particularly in the Philippines and India, and any disruption to those operations would adversely affect us.

Our business and future growth depend largely on continued demand for our services performed in the Philippines and the United States. During the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, we derived 56% of our revenue from work performed in the Philippines and 36% of our revenue from work performed in the United States. Outside of the Philippines and the United States, a substantial portion of our operations are conducted in India. The Philippines has experienced political instability, acts of natural disaster, such as typhoons and flooding, and the occasional health and security threat and continues to be at risk of similar and other events that may disrupt our operations. In addition, we have benefited from many policies of the Government of India and the Indian state government in the state in which we operate which are designed to promote foreign investment. There is no assurance that such policies will continue. Various factors, such as changes in the central or state governments, could trigger significant changes in India’s economic liberalization and deregulation policies and disrupt business and economic conditions in India generally and our business in particular. We also conduct operations in Mexico, Taiwan, Ireland and Greece which are subject to various risks germane to those locations.

Our international operations, particularly in the Philippines and India, and our ability to maintain our offshore sites in those jurisdictions are an essential component of our business model, as the labor costs in certain of those jurisdictions are substantially lower than the cost of comparable labor in the United States and other developed countries, which allows us to competitively price our solutions. Our competitive advantage would be greatly diminished and may disappear altogether as a result of a number of factors, including:

 

   

political unrest;

 

   

social unrest;

 

   

terrorism or war;

 

   

health pandemics (including the COVID-19 pandemic) or epidemics;

 

   

failure of power grids in certain of the countries in which we operate, which are subject to frequent outages;

 

   

currency fluctuations;

 

   

changes to the laws of the jurisdictions in which we operate; or

 

   

increases in the cost of labor and supplies in the jurisdictions in which we operate.

Our business and our international operations may also be affected by actual or threatened trade war or other governmental action related to trade restrictions, such as tariffs or other trade controls. If we are unable to continue to leverage the skills and experience of our international workforce, particularly in the Philippines and India, we may be unable to provide our solutions at an attractive price and our business could be materially and negatively impacted.

 

32


Table of Contents

Our business may also be affected by the United Kingdom’s departure from the European Union (“Brexit”). The United Kingdom formally left the European Union on January 31, 2020, with a transitional period which ended on December 31, 2020. There is continued uncertainty surrounding the future relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union, including trade agreements between the United Kingdom and European Union. Additionally, long-term risks of Brexit include economic recessions in the United Kingdom or other European markets and currency instability for both the British Pound Sterling and the Euro. Although we do not expect any direct adverse impact on our business from Brexit, any adverse impact of Brexit on our clients may reduce their demand for our services and solutions.

Our business is subject to a variety of U.S. and international laws and regulations, including those regarding privacy and data security, and we or our clients may be subject to regulations related to the handling and transfer of certain types of sensitive and confidential information. Any failure to comply with applicable privacy and data security laws and regulations could harm our business, results of operations and financial condition.

We and our clients are subject to privacy- and data security-related laws and regulations that impose obligations in connection with the collection, use, storage, transfer, dissemination, security, and/or other processing of personal information and other sensitive or regulated data. Existing U.S. federal and various state and foreign privacy- and information security-related laws and regulations are rapidly evolving and subject to potentially differing interpretations, and we expect that legislative and regulatory bodies will expand existing or enact new laws and regulations regarding privacy- and information security-related matters in the future. New laws, amendments to, or re-interpretations of existing laws and regulations, rules of self-regulatory bodies, industry standards and contractual obligations may each impact our business and practices, and we may be required to expend significant resources to adapt to these changes, or stop offering our services and solutions in certain countries. In addition, because the scope of these laws is changing and may be subject to differing interpretations, and may be inconsistent among countries and jurisdictions in which we operate, or conflict with other rules, it may be costly for us to comply with these laws and regulations, and our attempts to comply with them may adversely affect our business, results of operations and financial condition.

The U.S. federal and various state and foreign governments have adopted or proposed limitations on, or requirements regarding, the collection, retention, storage, use, processing, sharing, and disclosing of personal information. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission and numerous state attorneys general are applying federal and state consumer protection laws to impose standards on the collecting, retaining, storing, using, processing, sharing, and disclosing of personal information, and to the security measures applied to such information. Similarly, many foreign countries and governmental bodies, including the EU member states, have laws and regulations concerning the collection, retention, storage, use, processing, sharing, and disclosing of personal information obtained from individuals located, or business operating, in the such countries. For example, the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) became effective on May 25, 2018, and has resulted and will continue to result in significantly greater compliance burdens and costs for companies with customers, users, or operations in the European Union. Under GDPR, fines of up to 20 million Euros or up to 4% of the annual global revenues of the infringer, whichever is greater, can be imposed for violations. The GDPR imposes several stringent requirements for organizations that control or process personal information and could make it more difficult or more costly for us to use and share personal information in the ordinary course of our business. In addition, the exit of the United Kingdom from the European Union has created two parallel data protection regimes, with the UK law mirroring the GDPR many ways, including with respect to potential fines and penalties. In addition, the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), which went into effect on January 1, 2020, limits how we may collect and use personal data. The effects of the CCPA potentially are far-reaching and may require us to modify our data processing practices and policies and incur substantial compliance-related costs and expenses. Under the CCPA, in the event of a data breach affecting California residents’ personal information as a result of failure to maintain reasonable security procedures and practices can trigger a private right of action lawsuit, and as a result data breach litigation is likely to increase. Damages available for private rights of action range from $100 to $750 per violation or actual damages, whichever greater, with injunctive or declaratory relief also possible. In addition to the data breach private right of action, the California Attorney

 

33


Table of Contents

General may independently bring administrative actions for civil penalties of $2,500 per violation, or up to $7,500 per violation if intentional. Some observers have noted that the CCPA could mark the beginning of a trend toward more stringent privacy legislation in the U.S., which could increase our potential liability related to privacy and data security under United States law, require us to change our business practices, and adversely affect our business. Other states and the United States federal government are considering comprehensive privacy laws, and on March 2, 2021, the Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act (“CDPA”) was signed into law. The CDPA becomes effective January 1, 2023, and contains provisions that require businesses to conduct data protection assessments in certain circumstances, and that require opt-in consent from consumers to process certain sensitive personal information.

Both the European Union and California are also considering or have already passed new regulations and laws. The European Union is considering another draft data protection regulation, known as the Regulation on Privacy and Electronic Communications, or ePrivacy Regulation, which would replace the current ePrivacy Directive and addresses topics such as unsolicited marketing and cookies. Originally planned to be adopted and implemented at the same time as the GDPR, the ePrivacy Regulation has been delayed. Recent discussions were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, further delaying enactment of this regulation, the details of which remain in flux. Additionally, in November 2020, California voters approved a ballot initiative known as the California Privacy Rights Act of 2020 (“CPRA”). The CPRA will amend the CCPA by creating additional privacy rights for California consumers and additional obligations on businesses and will take effect in most material respects on January 1, 2023 (with application to data collected beginning on January 1, 2022). Implementation of either the ePrivacy Directive or the CPRA could require us to expend additional time and effort to comply with these new regulations and laws, and we could be subject to new or increased fines, individual claims, commercial liabilities, or regulatory penalties.

In addition, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) issued a decision on July 16, 2020, invalidating the EU-US Privacy Shield Framework on which we and certain of our services providers relied to conduct data transfers in compliance with the GDPR. While the decision did not invalidate standard contractual clauses, another mechanism for making cross-border transfers, the decision has called the validity of standard contractual clauses into question under certain circumstances, and has made the legality of transferring personal information from the EU to the United States more uncertain. Specifically, the CJEU stated that companies must now assess the validity of standard contractual clauses on a case by case basis, taking into consideration whether the standard contractual clauses provide sufficient protection in light of any access by the public authorities of the third country to where the personal information is transferred, and the relevant aspects of the legal system of such third country. In addition, if we were to cease our compliance with our Privacy Shield commitments, we could still be subject to action by the Federal Trade Commission. This decision, and increased uncertainty surrounding data transfers from the EU to the U.S., may increase our costs of compliance, impede our ability to transfer data and conduct our business, and may harm our business or results of operations. In addition, it is still unclear whether transfer of data from the EU to the United Kingdom will remain lawful under the GDPR. On December 24, 2020, the United Kingdom and EU entered into a Trade and Cooperation Agreement, which provides for a transitional period during which the United Kingdom will be treated like an EU member state in relation to processing and transfers of personal data for four months from January 1, 2021. This may be extended by two further months. The EU Commission issued a draft adequacy decision for the UK on February 19, 2021, but this has not yet been adopted. If the adequacy decision is not adopted after the period provided for in the Trade and Cooperation Agreement, the United Kingdom will be a “third country” under the GDPR unless the European Commission adopts an adequacy decision in respect of transfers of personal data to the United Kingdom.

In the United States, the federal government, including the White House, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Commerce and Congress, and many state governments are reviewing the need for greater regulation of the collection, processing, storage, sharing, disclosure, use and security of information concerning consumer behavior with respect to online services, including regulations aimed at restricting certain targeted advertising practices and collection and use of data from mobile devices. This review may result in new laws or the promulgation of new regulations or guidelines. For example, the State of California and other states have

 

34


Table of Contents

passed laws relating to disclosure of companies’ practices with regard to Do-Not-Track signals from internet browsers, the ability to delete information of minors, and data breach notification requirements. Outside the European Union and the United States, a number of countries have adopted or are considering privacy laws and regulations that may result in significant greater compliance burdens.

Data privacy and security are active areas and new laws and regulations are likely to be enacted. We expect that there will continue to be new proposed laws, regulations and industry standards concerning privacy, data protection and information security in the United States, the European Union and other jurisdictions, and we cannot yet determine the impact such future laws, regulations and standards may have on our business. Because global laws, regulations, industry standards and other legal obligations concerning privacy and data security have continued to develop and evolve rapidly, it is possible that we or our business may not be, or may not have been, compliant with each such applicable law, regulation, industry standard or other legal obligation. We or our third-party service providers could be adversely affected if legislation or regulations are expanded to require changes in our or our third-party service providers’ business practices or if governing jurisdictions interpret or implement their legislation or regulations in ways that negatively affect our or our third-party service providers’ business, results of operations or financial condition. Any such new laws, regulations, other legal obligations or industry standards, or any changed interpretation of existing laws, regulations or other standards may require us to incur additional costs and restrict our business operations. If our privacy or data security measures fail to comply with current or future laws, regulations, policies, legal obligations or industry standards, we may be subject to litigation, regulatory investigations, fines or other liabilities, as well as negative publicity and a potential loss of business.

Although we believe we take reasonable efforts to comply with all applicable laws and regulations with respect to security of our own systems, networks, and data, we rely heavily on the use of our clients’ systems to perform services, and we have no ability to control our clients’ systems, policies and practices or ensure that there are adequate safeguards in place with respect to these systems. There can be no assurance that we will not be subject to regulatory action, including fines, in the event of an incident or actual or perceived non-compliance. We also strive to comply with applicable industry standards and codes of conduct relating to privacy and information security, and are subject to the terms of our own privacy policies and privacy-related obligations to third parties. Any failure or perceived failure by us to comply with applicable laws and regulations, our privacy policies, our privacy-related obligations to clients, customers or other third parties, our data disclosure and consent obligations, or any compromise of security that results in the unauthorized disclosure, transfer or use of personal or other information, may result in governmental enforcement actions, litigation or public statements critical of us by consumer advocacy groups or others and could cause our clients to lose trust in us, which could have an adverse effect on our business. Further, although we generally obtain and rely on contractual representations that our clients are in compliance with applicable laws and regulations, any such failure or perceived failure by our clients with respect to their users, customers or other third parties, or any failure or perceived failure of our clients to follow their publicly posted privacy policies or other agreements with their users, customers, or other third parties, may result in similar consequences to them and, to the extent our work for such clients is associated with such failure or perceived failure, to us. For example, the data collection and processing activities of certain of our clients have been the subject of negative commentary relating to such clients’ privacy practices. Additionally, if third parties we work with violate applicable laws, our policies or other privacy or security-related obligations, such violations may also put our clients’ information at risk and could in turn have an adverse effect on our business. Governmental agencies may also request or take data for national security or informational purposes, and also can make data requests in connection with criminal or civil investigations or other matters, which could harm our reputation and our business.

Certain of our clients are engaged in highly regulated industries and require solutions that ensure security given the nature of the content and information being distributed and associated applicable regulatory requirements. In particular, our employees may access protected health information in compliance with the requirements of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, as amended by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, and related regulations, which are collectively

 

35


Table of Contents

referred to as HIPAA. HIPAA imposes privacy, security and breach notification obligations on certain health care providers, health plans, and health care clearinghouses, known as covered entities, as well as their business associates that perform certain services that involve creating, receiving, maintaining or transmitting protected health information for or on behalf of such covered entities. Persons that are found to be in violation of HIPAA may be subject to significant civil, criminal and administrative fines and penalties and/or additional reporting and oversight obligations if required to enter into a resolution agreement and corrective action plan with HHS to settle allegations of HIPAA non-compliance. Further, persons that knowingly obtain, use, or disclose protected health information maintained by a HIPAA covered entity in a manner that is not authorized or permitted by HIPAA may be subject to criminal penalties. As a “business associate,” we are directly liable for compliance with HIPAA’s privacy and security requirements. We also have obligations under the business associate agreements that we are required to enter into with certain clients that are covered by HIPAA and certain subcontractors that we engage in connection with our business operations. Compliance efforts can be expensive and burdensome, and if we fail to comply with our obligations under HIPAA we may be subject to penalties, mitigation and breach notification expenses, private litigation and contractual damages, corrective action plans and related regulatory oversight and reputational harm.

In addition to privacy and data security requirements under applicable laws, we are subject to the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (“PCI-DSS”) a self-regulatory standard that requires companies that process payment card data to implement certain data security measures. If we or our payment processors fail to comply with the PCI-DSS, we may incur significant fines or liability and lose access to major payment card systems. Failure to maintain PCI-DSS standards may amount to a violation of certain contractual obligations to our clients or may impair our ability to attract or retain business. Industry groups may in the future adopt additional self-regulatory standards by which we are legally or contractually bound.

Our business depends in part on our capacity to invest in technology as it develops, and substantial increases in the costs of technology and telecommunications services or our inability to attract and retain the necessary technologists could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

The use of technology in our industry has and is expected to continue to expand and change rapidly. Our business depends, in part, upon our ability to develop and implement solutions that anticipate and keep pace with continuing changes in technology, industry standards and client preferences. We may incur significant expenses in an effort to keep pace with client preferences for technology or to gain a competitive advantage through technological expertise or new technologies.

If we do not recognize the importance of a particular new technology to our business in a timely manner, are not committed to investing in and developing or adopting such new technology and applying these technologies to our business, or are unable to attract and retain the technologists necessary to develop and implement such technologies, our current solutions may be less attractive to existing and new clients, and we may lose market share to competitors who have recognized these trends and invested in such technology. There can be no assurance that we will have sufficient capacity or capital to meet these challenges. Any such failure to recognize the importance of such technology, a decision not to invest in and develop or adopt such technology that keeps pace with evolving industry standards and changing client demands, or an inability to attract and retain the technologists necessary to develop and implement such technology could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Our results of operations and ability to grow could be materially affected if we cannot adapt our services and solutions to changes in technology and client expectations.

Our growth and profitability will depend on our ability to develop and adopt new services and solutions that expand our existing offerings by leveraging new technological trends and cost efficiencies in our operations, while meeting rapidly evolving client expectations. As technology evolves, more tasks currently performed by

 

36


Table of Contents

our team members may be replaced by automation, robotics, artificial intelligence, chatbots and other technological advances, which puts our lower-skill tier one customer care offerings at risk. These technology innovations could potentially reduce our business volumes and related revenues, unless we are successful in adapting and deploying them profitably.

We may not be successful in anticipating or responding to our client expectations and interests in adopting evolving technology solutions, and their integration in our offerings may not achieve the intended enhancements or cost reductions. Services and solutions offered by our competitors may make our services and solutions not competitive or even obsolete and may negatively impact our clients’ interest in our solutions. Our failure to innovate, maintain technological advantages, or respond effectively and timely to transformational changes in technology could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Fluctuations against the U.S. dollar in the local currencies in the countries in which we operate could have a material effect on our results of operations.

A majority of our revenues are in U.S. Dollars and our costs are primarily in local currencies, including the U.S Dollar, Philippine Peso, Indian Rupee, Mexican Peso, Euro and Taiwanese Dollar. While we utilize hedging contracts, an appreciation of local currencies against the U.S. Dollar would cause a net adverse impact to our profitability. Our exchange rate forward contracts are not designated hedges under Accounting Standards Codification Topic 815, Derivatives and Hedging. Because our financial statements are presented in U.S. dollars and revenues are primarily generated in U.S. dollars, whereas some portion of the cost is incurred in foreign currencies, any significant unhedged fluctuations in the currency exchange rates between the U.S. dollar and the currencies of countries in which we incur costs in local currencies will affect our results of operations and financial statements. This may also affect the comparability of our financial results from period to period, as we convert our subsidiaries’ statements of financial position into U.S. dollars from local currencies at the period-end exchange rate, and income and cash flow statements at average exchange rates for the year. See “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Trends and Factors Affecting our Performance.”

As we increase our revenues from non-U.S. sites or expand our solution delivery or back office footprint to other international locations, this effect may be magnified. We may in the future engage in additional hedging strategies in an effort to reduce the adverse impact of fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates, which may not be successful. See also “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk— Foreign Currency Risk.”

Our business depends on a strong brand and corporate reputation, and if we are not able to maintain and enhance our brand, our ability to expand our client base will be impaired and our business and operating results will be adversely affected.

Our corporate reputation is a significant factor in our clients’ and prospective clients’ determination of whether to engage us. We believe the TaskUs brand name and our reputation are important corporate assets that help distinguish our services from those of our competitors and also contribute to our efforts to recruit and retain talented employees. However, our corporate reputation is susceptible to damage by actions or statements made by current or former employees or clients, competitors, vendors, adversaries in legal proceedings and government regulators, as well as members of the investment community and the media. Our reputation could also be harmed by our association with certain clients with high visibility in the public. There is a risk that negative information about our company, even if based on false rumor or misunderstanding, could adversely affect our business. In particular, damage to our reputation could be difficult and time consuming to repair, could make potential or existing clients reluctant to select us for new engagements, resulting in a loss of business, and could adversely affect our recruitment and retention efforts. Damage to our reputation could also reduce the value and effectiveness of our TaskUs brand name and investor confidence in us and result in a decline in the price of our Class A common stock.

 

37


Table of Contents

Competitive pricing pressure may reduce our revenue or gross profits and adversely affect our financial results.

The prices for our services and solutions may decline for a variety of reasons, including pricing pressures from our competitors, pricing leverage from clients, anticipation of the introduction of new solutions by our competitors, or promotional programs offered by us or our competitors. In particular, we tend to face increased pricing pressure from our key clients as we grow the existing services and solutions we provide to our key clients or expand our business with them by cross-selling new services and solutions. In addition, competition continues to increase in the markets in which we operate, and we expect competition to further increase in the future. If we are unable to maintain our pricing due to competitive pressures or other factors, our margins will be reduced and our gross profits, business, financial condition and results of operations would be adversely affected.

The success of our business depends on our senior management and key employees.

Our success depends on the continued service and performance of our senior management, particularly Bryce Maddock, our Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer, and Jaspar Weir, our Co-Founder and President, and other key employees. In each of the industries in which we participate, there is competition for experienced senior management and personnel with industry-specific expertise. We may not be able to retain our key personnel or recruit skilled personnel with appropriate qualifications and experience. The loss of key members of our personnel, particularly to competitors, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We currently do not maintain key man life insurance for any of the members of our senior management team or other key employees. We also do not have long-term employment contracts with all of our key employees. If one or more of our senior executives or key employees are unable or unwilling to continue in their present positions, it could disrupt our business operations, and we may not be able to replace them easily, on a timely basis or at all.

If any of our senior management team or key employees joins a competitor or forms a competing company, we may lose clients, suppliers, know-how and technology professionals and staff members to them. Also, if any of our sales executives or other sales personnel, who generally maintain close relationships with our clients, join a competitor or form a competing company, we may lose clients to that company, and our revenue may be materially adversely affected. Additionally, there could be unauthorized disclosure or use of our technical knowledge, business practices or procedures by such personnel. Any non-competition, non-solicitation or non-disclosure agreements we have with our senior executives or key employees might not provide effective protection to us in light of legal uncertainties associated with the enforceability of such agreements.

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 transition to being a public company that is 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 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.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, including the resulting global economic uncertainty and measures taken in response to the pandemic, has adversely impacted our business, financial condition and results of operations, especially in the first half of 2020, and may continue to do so.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a widespread and detrimental effect on the global economy and has adversely impacted our business and results of operations, especially in the first half of 2020. Although we

 

38


Table of Contents

successfully mobilized and implemented a virtual operating model in 2020 in response to the pandemic, we are unable to accurately predict the full impact that the COVID-19 pandemic, including new and more virulent strains of the virus, will have on our results from operations, financial condition, liquidity and cash flows due to numerous uncertainties, including the duration and severity of the COVID-19 pandemic and the success of containment and vaccination measures. Our compliance with additional health and safety measures has impacted our day-to-day operations and disrupted our business and the business of our clients. Because the severity, magnitude and duration of the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic consequences are highly uncertain, rapidly changing and difficult to predict, the ultimate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our business, financial condition and results of operations remains unknown.

The extent to which the COVID-19 pandemic continues to adversely impact our business and results of operations will depend on numerous evolving factors that are difficult to predict and outside of our control, including: the duration and scope of the COVID-19 pandemic; actions taken by governments and other parties, including our clients, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic; the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on economic activity and actions taken in response; the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on our clients and client demand for our services and solutions; the ability of our clients to pay for our services and solutions on time or at all; our ability to sell and provide our services and solutions to clients and prospects; the ability of our employees to continue to successfully work remotely without suffering productivity issues due to, among other things, their own illness or the illness of family members, distractions at home, including family issues or virtual school learning for their children and/or unreliable or unstable internet connections; and our ability to fully resume operations in our sites affected by, among other things, the ability of certain of our employees to rejoin working in our sites, the difficulties our employees may face commuting due to limited or a lack of public transportation, and the unpredictability as to the timing of fully reopening our sites.

We have experienced travel bans, states of emergency, quarantines, lockdowns, “shelter in place” orders, business restrictions and shutdowns in the countries where we operate. In the interest of the health and safety of our employees and due to restrictions imposed by national or local governments, in March 2020 we rapidly mobilized our operations to deliver our services remotely from the homes of our individual employees. This effort posed, and continues to pose, numerous operational risks and logistical challenges and has increased certain costs and risks to our business, including increased demand on our information technology resources and systems that were designed for most of our employees to work from our sites and not remotely, inability to use or access facilities, enhanced risk that remote assets like computers or routers might be damaged or not returned, the movement of assets from a tax free zone to a work from home location that might trigger new increased taxation should the tax authorities decide to reinstate requirements of being on-site for special tax treatment that were temporarily waived during COVID-19, increased equipment costs due to the inability to use the same equipment, such as computers, IT equipment and workspaces, for multiple shifts, increased phishing, ransomware and other cybersecurity attacks as cybercriminals try to exploit the uncertainty surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, and increased data privacy and security risks as substantially all our employees work remotely from environments that may be less secure than those of our sites. In 2020, we incurred $7.5 million in costs and expenses related to the transition to a virtual operating model and incentive and leave pay granted to employees that were directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic. Any failure to effectively manage these risks, including to timely identify and appropriately respond to any cyberattacks, may adversely affect our business. Further, we currently and may in the future face lease disputes with our landlords over rents demanded during COVID-19 lockdown or “shelter in place” orders.

In addition, certain of our clients have not consented (or may not continue to consent) to or have limited programs eligible for work-at-home arrangements in connection with the services we deliver to them. Further, certain of our employees have been unable to transition to a work-at-home environment due to broadband and/or work environment deficiencies in their homes, and as a result we have been unable to fully staff as needed and to deliver at the same volumes to the same extent we were prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. We are also exposed to the risk that continued government-imposed restrictions or frequently changing government-imposed restrictions, such as enhanced quarantine areas, lockdowns or cessation of transportation which

 

39


Table of Contents

adversely affect our employees’ ability to access our sites, could further disrupt our ability to provide our services and solutions and result in, among other things, terminations of client contracts and losses of revenue or additional costs borne by us to provide temporary housing or transportation to our employees to allow them to access our sites, which could also leave us vulnerable to risks related to employee safety, road hazards and other related hazards. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we regularly clean and sanitize equipment in our sites between shifts, observe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Occupational Safety and Health Administration guidelines and guidelines issued by equivalent agencies in foreign jurisdictions, and keep our sites closed until 30 days after local governments permit such sites to reopen. Even after implementing social distancing, enhanced cleaning procedures and other mitigating measures, there is no guarantee that we will not have an outbreak of the virus that causes COVID-19 at one of our sites, which could result in a significantly reduced workforce due to infection or a significant percentage of our workforce in a site being quarantined due to exposure as a result of contact tracing, and a governmental authority could close our site as a result, which could impact cash flows from operations and liquidity. Further, even with respect to clients who have consented to work-at-home arrangements for some or all of their programs, there is no guarantee that these clients will continue to permit these work-at-home arrangements and revocation by any clients of their consent to these arrangements could also result in loss of revenue in the future.

Our business strategy depends in part on our employee-centered culture. The significant personal and business challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic, including the potentially life-threatening health risks to employees and their families and friends, the closures of schools and the unavailability of various services that some of our employees rely upon, such as childcare or public transportation, may adversely impact employee productivity and result in increased absenteeism and leaves of absence.

We have experienced and may continue to experience reluctance of the workforce to return to our sites during the COVID-19 pandemic due to concerns related to returning to a communal workplace including, for their own health if they are part of a vulnerable population or have vulnerable family members at home and enhanced government unemployment incentives that may result in temporarily higher income from unemployment that may exceed local prevailing wages and may make it more difficult for us to encourage our workforce to return to work or hire a sufficient number of employees to support our contractual commitments or may result in higher costs, higher turnover and reduced operational efficiencies, which could, in the aggregate, have a material adverse impact on our results of operations.

Social distancing rules and other government mandates in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic may continue to impact the structure and configuration of our sites, where employees work in close proximity. If these new regulatory requirements remain in effect for the medium-term or the long-term, we may be forced to make significant capital investments to reconfigure our existing sites and to accept lower capacity utilization than the utilization priced under our multi-year contracts or to expand our capacity into new space in certain geographies to accommodate our workforce, which will result in increased capital expenditures and a degradation of our gross margin and profitability under the negotiated cost structures for the client. If we are unable to recoup these additional costs by renegotiating our contracts or by adjusting the price when we renew our contracts or otherwise adjust our cost structure to absorb them, our margins and profitability will be impacted and will result in adverse impact on our results of operations. Further, such rules and regulations may impair our ability to develop and implement agile workforce strategies, which would reduce our ability to meet any increase in client demand for our services. We could also see an increase in health care costs for employees due to emerging regulations regarding COVID-19 testing, telemedicine, and in the future, coverage for any vaccine. Historically, pandemic conditions have led to sweeping changes in governmental regulations regarding the use and payment of sick time and vacation/leave time, which could have a material adverse effect on our future labor costs.

The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic could result in slowed decision-making and delayed planned work by our clients. Some of our clients, especially in the on-demand transportation industry, have experienced a decline in their end customer volumes because of lockdown restrictions globally, which has resulted in reduced demand from our services from those clients. As certain of our clients face reduced demand for their products

 

40


Table of Contents

and solutions, reduce their business activity and face increased financial pressure on their businesses, we have faced and expect to continue to face downward pressure on our pricing and gross margins due to pricing concessions to clients and requests from clients to extend payment cycles. In addition, some clients have been financially impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and, as a result, have delayed and may continue to delay payments, which may have an adverse effect on our cash flows from operations. We have faced client bankruptcy and may continue to face a significantly elevated risk of client insolvency, bankruptcy or liquidity challenges where we may perform services and incurred expenses for which we are not paid. While several clients, especially in the On Demand Travel + Transportation, Social Media, Entertainment + Gaming, and Retail + e-Commerce industries, have witnessed an increase in demand driven by an increase in online commerce and content consumption, resulting in more demand for our services and solutions, such demand for our clients’ products and services may stabilize or decrease as the COVID-19 pandemic subsides, causing reduced demand for our services and solutions.

The overall uncertainty regarding the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact on our revenue growth could impact our cash flows from operations and liquidity. Increased currency exchange-rate fluctuations and an inability to recover costs or lost revenues or profits from insurance carriers could all adversely affect us, our financial condition and our results of operations. Additionally, the disruptions and volatility in the global and domestic capital markets may increase the cost of capital and limit our ability to access capital.

Our efforts to mitigate the negative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on our business may not be effective, and if there is a protracted economic downturn, we and our clients may be affected. Even after the COVID-19 pandemic has subsided, we may continue to experience negative effects as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic’s global economic impact. Further, as this COVID-19 pandemic is unprecedented and continuously evolving, it may also affect our operating and financial results in a manner that is not presently known to us or in a manner that we currently do not consider will present significant risks to us or our operations.

For more information, see “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—COVID-19.”

Risks Related to Macro-Economic, Geographical and Political Conditions

Natural events, health pandemics (including the COVID-19 pandemic) or epidemics, infrastructure breakdowns, wars, widespread civil unrest, terrorist attacks and other acts of violence involving any of the countries in which we or our clients have operations could adversely affect our operations and client confidence.

Natural events (such as floods, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis and earthquakes), health pandemics or epidemics, wars, widespread civil unrest, terrorist attacks and other acts of violence or war could result in significant worker absenteeism, increased attrition rates, lower asset utilization rates, voluntary or mandatory closure of our sites, our inability to meet dynamic employee health and safety requirements, our inability to meet contractual service levels for our clients, our inability to procure essential supplies, travel restrictions on our employees, and other disruptions to our business. For instance, the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the mandatory closure of some of our sites. In particular, a natural disaster, catastrophic event or public health pandemic or epidemic could cause us or our clients to suspend all or a portion of their operations for a significant period of time, result in a permanent loss of resources, or require the relocation of personnel and material to alternate sites that may not be available or adequate. Such events could adversely affect global economies, worldwide financial markets and our clients’ levels of business activity and could potentially lead to economic recession, which could impact our clients’ purchasing decisions and reduce demand for our services and solutions and, consequently, adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows.

In addition, global climate change is expected to result in certain natural disasters occurring more frequently or with greater intensity, such as tsunamis, cyclones, typhoons, drought, wildfires, sea-level rise, heavy rains and

 

41


Table of Contents

flooding. Any such disaster or series of disasters in areas where we have a concentration of sites, such as the Philippines, India, or Texas, could significantly disrupt our operations and have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations and financial condition. For example, a significant portion of our operations are located in or near Manila, Philippines, in sites that are in close proximity to each other. A natural disaster, fire, earthquake, volcanic activity, tsunami, power interruption, work stoppage, outbreaks of pandemics or contagious diseases (such as the COVID-19 pandemic) or other calamity in the Manila metropolitan area would significantly disrupt our ability to deliver our solutions and services and operate our business.

Our sites, key technology systems and data and voice communications may also be damaged or disrupted as a result of technical disruptions such as electricity or infrastructure breakdowns, including from additional stress relating to an increase in working from home and Wi-Fi usage due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and including damage to telecommunications cables, computer glitches, power failures and electronic viruses or human-caused events such as protests, riots, labor unrest, terrorist attacks and cyberattacks. Such events, or any natural or weather-related disaster, could lead to the disruption of information systems and telecommunication services for sustained periods. They also may make it difficult or impossible for employees to reach our sites. Any significant failure, damage or destruction of our equipment or systems, or any major disruptions to basic infrastructure such as power and telecommunications systems in the sites in which we operate, could impede our ability to provide solutions to our clients and thus adversely affect their businesses, have a negative impact on our reputation and may cause us to incur substantial additional expenses to repair or replace damaged equipment, internet server connections, information technology systems or sites. Damage or destruction that interrupts our provision of services could adversely affect our reputation, our relationships with our clients, our leadership team’s ability to administer and supervise our business or it may cause us to incur substantial additional expenditure to repair or replace damaged equipment or sites. In addition, operations of our significant suppliers and distributors could be adversely affected if manufacturing, logistics or other operations in these locations are disrupted for any reason, such as those listed above, and, consequently, our operations could be adversely affected. Even if our operations are unaffected or recover quickly from any such events, if our clients cannot timely resume their own operations due to a catastrophic event, they may reduce or cancel their orders, which may adversely affect our results of operations. We may also be liable to our clients for disruption in service resulting from such damage or destruction. Any of these events, their consequences or the costs related to mitigation or remediation could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

While we maintain property and business interruption insurance, our insurance coverage may not be sufficient to guarantee costs of repairing the damage caused by such disruptive events and such events may not be covered under our policies. Prolonged disruption of our services and solutions, even if due to events beyond our control, could also entitle our clients to terminate their contracts with us or result in other brand and reputational damages, which would have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Our operations in emerging markets subject us to greater economic, financial, and banking risks than we would face in more developed markets.

We have significant operations in certain emerging market economies, including the Philippines and India. Emerging markets are vulnerable to market and economic volatility to a greater extent than more developed markets, which presents risks to our business and operations. A significant portion of our revenues are generated by services for companies headquartered in the United States. However, many of our personnel and sites are located in lower cost locations, including emerging markets. This exposes us to foreign exchange risks relating to revenues, compensation, purchases, capital expenditures, receivables and other balance-sheet items. As we continue to leverage and expand our global delivery model into other emerging markets, a larger portion of our revenues and incurred expenses may be in currencies other than U.S. dollars. Currency exchange volatility caused by economic instability or other factors could materially impact our results. See “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk.”

 

42


Table of Contents

The economies of certain emerging market countries where we operate have experienced periods of considerable instability and have been subject to abrupt downturns. We have cash in banks in countries where the banking sector generally does not meet the banking standards of more developed markets, bank deposits made by corporate entities are not insured, and the banking system remains subject to instability. A banking crisis, or the bankruptcy or insolvency of banks that receive or hold our funds, particularly in the United States, may result in the loss of our deposits or adversely affect our ability to complete banking transactions in that region. In addition, some countries where we operate may impose regulatory or practical restrictions on the movement of cash and the exchange of foreign currencies within their banking systems, which would limit our ability to use cash across our global operations and increase our exposure to currency fluctuations. Emerging market vulnerability, and especially its impact on currency exchange volatility and banking systems, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Risks Related to Our Growth and Business Strategies

We may face difficulties as we expand our operations into countries in which we have no prior operating experience and in which we may be subject to increased business and economic risks that could impact our results of operations.

We expect to continue to expand our international operations in order to maintain an appropriate cost structure and meet our clients’ needs, which may include opening sites in new jurisdictions and providing our services and solutions in additional languages. We expect our expansion efforts will include expanding into countries other than those in which we currently operate and where we have less familiarity with local procedures. It may involve expanding into less developed countries, which may have less political, social or economic stability and less developed infrastructure and legal systems. As we expand our business into new countries, we may encounter economic, regulatory, personnel, technological and other difficulties that increase our expenses or delay our ability to start up our operations or become profitable in such countries. This may affect our relationships with our clients and could have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Any new markets or countries into which we attempt to provide our services and solutions may not be receptive. In addition, our ability to manage our business and conduct our operations internationally requires considerable management attention and resources and is subject to the particular challenges of supporting a rapidly growing business in an environment of multiple languages, cultures, customs, legal and regulatory systems, alternative dispute systems, and commercial markets. International expansion has required, and will continue to require, investment of significant funds and other resources. Operating internationally subjects us to new risks and may increase risks that we currently face, including risks associated with:

 

   

compliance with applicable international laws and regulations, including laws and regulations with respect to privacy, data protection, consumer protection, and unsolicited email, and the risk of penalties to our users and individual members of management or employees if our practices are deemed to be out of compliance;

 

   

recruiting and retaining talented and capable employees, and maintaining our company culture across our sites;

 

   

providing our services and solutions and operating our business across a significant distance, in different languages and among different cultures, including the potential need to modify our services and solutions to ensure that they are culturally appropriate and relevant in different countries;

 

   

management of an employee base in jurisdictions, such as Greece and Ireland, that do not give us the same employment and retention flexibility as does the United States;

 

   

operating in jurisdictions that do not protect intellectual property rights to the same extent as does the United States;

 

43


Table of Contents
   

compliance by us and our business partners with anti-corruption laws, import and export control laws, tariffs, trade barriers, economic sanctions, and other regulatory limitations on our ability to provide our platform in certain international markets;

 

   

foreign exchange controls that might require significant lead time in setting up operations in certain geographic territories and might prevent us from repatriating cash earned outside the United States;

 

   

political and economic instability;

 

   

changes in diplomatic and trade relationships, including the imposition of new trade restrictions, trade protection measures, import or export requirements, trade embargoes and other trade barriers;

 

   

double taxation of our international earnings and potentially adverse tax consequences due to changes in the income and other tax laws of the United States or the international jurisdictions in which we operate; and

 

   

higher costs of doing business internationally, including increased accounting, travel, infrastructure, and legal compliance costs.

Compliance with laws and regulations applicable to our international operations substantially increases our cost of doing business in international jurisdictions. We may be unable to keep current with changes in laws and regulations. Although we have implemented policies and procedures designed to support compliance with these laws and regulations, there can be no assurance that we will always maintain compliance or that all of our employees, contractors, partners, and agents will comply. Any violations could result in enforcement actions, fines, civil and criminal penalties, damages, injunctions, or reputational harm. If we are unable to comply with these laws and regulations or manage the complexity of our global operations successfully, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be adversely affected.

We face substantial competition in our business.

The markets in which we compete, comprised of, among others, customer experience, content security and AI operations market segments, is highly competitive, highly fragmented and continuously evolving. We face competition from a variety of companies, including some of our own clients, which operate in distinct segments of the customer lifecycle journey. These industry segments are very competitive, and we expect competition to remain intense from a number of sources in the future. We believe that the most significant competitive factors in the markets in which we operate are service quality, value-added service offerings, industry experience, advanced technological capabilities, global coverage, reliability, scalability, security, price, employee wellness and culture. Our services and solutions may easily be replicated by our competitors, our existing and potential clients may choose our competitors over us for any of the foregoing reasons or for other reasons. The trend toward near-shore and offshore outsourcing, international expansion by foreign and domestic competitors and continued technological changes may result in new and different competitors entering our markets. These competitors may include entrants in geographical locations with lower costs than those in which we operate.

We compete with large multinational service providers; offshore service providers from lower-cost jurisdictions like various parts of India and Latin America, depending on the service, that offer similar services, often at highly competitive prices and aggressive contract terms; niche solution providers that compete with us in specific geographic markets, industry segments or service areas; companies that utilize new, potentially disruptive technologies or delivery models, including artificial intelligence powered solutions; and in-house functions of large companies that use their own resources, rather than outsourcing the Digital Customer Experience services we provide.

Some of our existing and future competitors have or will have greater financial, human and other resources, longer operating histories, larger geographic presence, greater technological expertise and more established relationships in the industries that we currently serve or may serve in the future. Also, our services can be moved

 

44


Table of Contents

from one provider to another. Accordingly, we have faced, and expect to continue to face, competition from new market entrants and incumbents. In addition, some of our competitors may enter into strategic or commercial relationships among themselves or with larger, more established companies in order to increase their ability to address client needs and reduce operating costs, or enter into similar arrangements with potential clients. Further, trends of consolidation in our industries and among competitors may result in new competitors with greater scale, a broader footprint, better technologies and price efficiencies attractive to our clients. Increased competition, our inability to compete successfully, pricing pressures or loss of market share could result in reduced operating profit margins and diminished financial performance, which would have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

We may acquire other companies in pursuit of growth, which may divert our management’s attention, result in dilution to our shareholders and consume resources that are necessary to sustain our business.

As part of our business strategy, we regularly review potential strategic transactions, including potential acquisitions, dispositions, consolidations, joint ventures or similar transactions, some of which may be material. We expect to continue to evaluate on an ongoing basis, possible acquisition transactions. At any time in the future we may be engaged in discussions or negotiations with respect to possible acquisitions, including larger transactions that would be significant to us. We cannot predict the timing of any contemplated transactions.

Through the acquisitions we pursue, we may seek opportunities to add to or enhance the services and solutions we provide, to enter new industries or expand our client base, or to strengthen our global presence and scale of operations. Negotiating these transactions can be time consuming, difficult and expensive, and our ability to complete these transactions may be subject to conditions or approvals that are beyond our control, including anti-takeover and antitrust laws in various jurisdictions. Consequently, these transactions, even if undertaken and announced, may not close.

An acquisition, investment or new business relationship may result in unforeseen operating difficulties and expenditures. In particular, we may encounter difficulties assimilating or integrating the businesses, technologies, services, products, personnel or operations of acquired companies, particularly if the key personnel of the acquired company choose not to work for us, the acquired company’s technology is not easily compatible with ours or we have difficulty retaining the clients of any acquired business due to changes in management or otherwise. We have historically grown our operations organically, and we do not have significant experience managing the acquisition or a business, including with diligence or integration. Mergers or acquisitions may also disrupt our business, divert our resources and require significant management attention that would otherwise be available for the development of our business. Moreover, the anticipated benefits of any merger, acquisition, investment or similar partnership may not be realized or we may be exposed to unknown liabilities, including litigation against the companies we may acquire, for example from failure to identify all of the significant risks or liabilities associated with the target business. For one or more of those transactions, we may:

 

   

issue additional equity securities that would dilute our shareholders;

 

   

use cash that we may need in the future to operate our business;

 

   

incur debt on terms unfavorable to us or that we are unable to repay or that may place burdensome restrictions on our operations or cash flows;

 

   

incur large charges or substantial liabilities; or

 

   

become subject to adverse tax consequences, or substantial depreciation or amortization, deferred compensation or other acquisition related accounting charges.

Any of these risks could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

 

45


Table of Contents

Our success largely depends on our ability to achieve our business strategies, and our results of operations and financial condition may suffer if we are unable to continually develop and successfully execute our strategies.

Our future growth, profitability and cash flows largely depend upon our ability to continually develop and successfully execute our business strategies. While we believe that our strategic plans reflect opportunities that are appropriate and achievable, the execution of our strategy may not result in long-term growth in revenue or profitability due to a number of factors, including:

 

   

the number, timing, scope and contractual terms of projects in which we are engaged;

 

   

unfavorable contract terms with clients, such as high limitations on liability, unlimited liability, or indemnification obligations;

 

   

delays in project commencement or staffing delays due to difficulty in assigning appropriately skilled or experienced employees;

 

   

the accuracy of estimates of the resources, time and fees required to complete projects and costs incurred in the performance of each project;

 

   

inability to retain employees or maintain employee utilization levels;

 

   

changes in pricing in response to client demand and competitive pressures;

 

   

the business decisions of our clients regarding the use of our services;

 

   

the ability to further grow sales of services from existing clients;

 

   

our clients’ desire to avoid concentrating spend in one or a limited number of outsourcing vendors;

 

   

seasonal trends and the budget and work cycles of our clients;

 

   

delays or difficulties in expanding our operational sites or infrastructure;

 

   

our ability to estimate costs under fixed price or managed service contracts;

 

   

employee wage levels and increases in compensation costs;

 

   

unanticipated contract or project terminations;

 

   

the timing of collection of accounts receivable;

 

   

our ability to manage risk through our contracts;

 

   

the continuing financial stability and growth of our clients;

 

   

changes in our effective tax rates;

 

   

fluctuations in currency exchange rates;

 

   

general economic conditions; and

 

   

the impact of public health pandemics, such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

In pursuit of our growth strategy, we may also invest significant time and resources into new service or solution offerings, and these offerings may fail to yield sufficient return to cover our investments in them. The failure to continually develop and execute optimally on our business strategies could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our success will depend in part upon the ability of our senior management to manage our projected growth effectively. To do so, we must continue to increase the productivity of our existing employees and to attract, hire, train and manage new employees as needed. To manage the expected domestic and international growth of our operations and personnel, we will need to continue to improve our operational, financial and management controls, our reporting systems and procedures, and our utilization of real estate. If we fail to successfully scale our operations and increase productivity, we may be unable to execute our business plan, and such failure could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

 

46


Table of Contents

We have a relatively short history of operating at a large, global scale and may not be able to sustain our revenue growth rate or profitability in the future.

We have experienced rapid revenue growth in recent periods. Our revenue increased by 32.9% from $360 million in the fiscal year ended December 31, 2019 to $478 million in the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, and our revenue increased by 49.2% from $102.4 million for the three-month period ended March 31, 2020 to $152.9 million for the three-month period ended March 31, 2021. Our rapid growth has been fueled in part by the rapid growth of our major clients in high growth industries, such as social media, meal delivery and transport, e-commerce and fintech. We may not be able to sustain revenue growth consistent with our recent history or at all. You should not consider our revenue growth in recent periods as indicative of our future performance. As we grow our business, we expect our revenue growth rates to slow in future periods. Our revenue growth rate may slow due to a number of factors, which may include slowing demand for our services, increasing competition, decreasing growth of our overall market, our inability to engage and retain a sufficient number of skilled employees or otherwise scale our business, prevailing wages in the markets in which we operate or our failure, for any reason, to capitalize on growth opportunities. In addition, any slowdown in the growth of our major clients, or the industries that we serve, may adversely impact the rate of our revenue growth. Additionally, we may experience a decrease in demand due to the worldwide economic impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

In addition, the industry in which we operate is continuously evolving. Competition, fueled by rapidly changing consumer demands and constant technological developments, renders the industry in which we operate one in which success and performance metrics are difficult to predict and measure. Because services and technologies are rapidly evolving and each company within the industry can vary greatly in terms of the services it provides, its business model, and its results of operations, it can be difficult to predict how any company’s services, including ours, will be received in the market. While enterprises have been willing to devote significant resources to incorporate new technologies and market practices into their business models, enterprises may not continue to spend any significant portion of their budgets on our services in the future. Our recent growth is due in part to our success in identifying sectors that have the potential for high-growth and acquiring new clients within those sectors; however, we may not be successful in identifying or acquiring high-growth clients in the future. Neither our past financial performance nor the past financial performance of any other company in the technology services industry or the business process outsourcing industry may be indicative of how our company will fare financially in the future. Our future profits may vary substantially from those of other companies, and those we have achieved in the past, making investment in our Class A common stock risky and speculative. If our clients’ demand for our services declines, as a result of economic conditions, market factors or shifts in the technology industry, our business would suffer and our financial condition and results of operations would be adversely affected.

The estimates of market opportunity and forecasts of market growth included in this prospectus may prove to be inaccurate, and even if the markets in which we compete achieve the forecasted growth, our business could fail to grow at similar rates, if at all.

Market opportunity estimates and growth forecasts are subject to significant uncertainty and are based on assumptions and estimates that may not prove to be accurate. The estimates and forecasts in this prospectus relating to the size and expected growth of the total addressable market for our services and solutions may prove to be inaccurate. Any expansion in our market depends on a number of factors, including the cost, performance and perceived value associated with our solutions and those of our competitors. Even if the markets in which we currently compete meet the size estimates and growth forecasted in this prospectus, our business could fail to grow at similar rates, if at all, and/or we may not continue to grow our share of the market. Our growth is subject to many factors, including our success in implementing our business strategy, which is subject to many risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, the forecasts of market growth included in this prospectus should not be taken as indicative of our future growth. In addition, our estimates of the addressable market for our current and future services and solutions are based on a number of internal and third-party estimates and assumptions. While we believe our assumptions and the data underlying our estimates are reasonable, these assumptions and estimates may not be correct. As a result, our estimates of our addressable markets for our current or future services and

 

47


Table of Contents

solutions may prove to be incorrect. If the actual addressable market for our services and solutions is smaller than we estimate, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. For more information regarding the estimates of market opportunity and the forecasts of market growth included in this prospectus, see “Market and Industry Data,” “Summary—Market Opportunity” and “Business—Market Opportunity.”

Risks Related to Labor, Employees and Management

Increases in employee expenses as well as changes to labor laws could reduce our profit margin.

We may not be successful in our attempt to control costs associated with salaries and benefits as we continue to add capacity in locations where we consider wage levels of skilled personnel to be satisfactory. For the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020 and for the three-month period ended March 31, 2021, payroll and related costs accounted for $311 million and $97 million, respectively, representing 65% and 63%, respectively, of our revenue in such period. Employee benefits expenses in each of the countries in which we operate are a function of the country’s economic growth, level of employment and overall competition for qualified employees in the country. In addition, wage inflation, whether driven by competition for talent or ordinary course pay increases, may increase our cost of providing services and reduce our profitability if we are not able to pass those costs on to our clients or charge premium prices when justified by market demand. We may need to increase employee compensation more than in previous periods to remain competitive in attracting the quantity and quality of employees that our business requires, which may reduce our profit margins and have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, cash flows and prospects. In addition, wage increases or other expenses related to the termination of our employees may reduce our profit margins and have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, cash flows and prospects. If we expand our operations into new jurisdictions, we may be subject to increased operating costs, including higher employee compensation expenses in these new jurisdictions relative to our current operating costs, which could have a negative effect on our profit margin.

Furthermore, many of the countries in which we operate have labor protection laws, which may include statutorily mandated minimum annual wage increases, legislation that imposes financial obligations on employers and laws governing the employment of workers. These labor laws in one or more of the key jurisdictions in which we operate, particularly in the United States, the Philippines or India, may be modified in the future in a way that is detrimental to our business. Recently, a number of state and local governments in the United States have increased the minimum wage for employees with other such laws proposed, and there have been various proposals discussed to increase the federal minimum wage in the United States. As federal or state minimum wage rates increase, we may need to increase the wages paid to our hourly team members. Further, should we fail to increase our wages competitively in response to increasing wage rates, the quality of our workforce could decline, causing our client service to suffer. Additionally, the U.S. Department of Labor has issued regulations increasing the minimum threshold for overtime “exempt” employees, and additional increases may be proposed, which could result in a substantial increase in our payroll expense. If these labor laws become more stringent, or if there are increases in statutory minimum wages or higher labor costs in these jurisdictions, it may become more difficult for us to discharge employees, or cost-effectively downsize our operations as our level of activity fluctuates, both of which would likely reduce our profit margins and have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Additionally, as we expand to other markets, some of those markets may have employment laws that provide greater job security, bargaining or other rights to employees than the laws in the United States. Such employment rights require us to work collaboratively with the legal representatives of the employees to effect any changes to labor arrangements. For example, in Europe employees may be represented by works councils that have co-determination rights on any changes in conditions of employment, including certain salaries and benefits and staff changes, and may impede efforts to restructure our workforce. A strike, work stoppage or slowdown by our employees or significant dispute with our employees, whether or not related to these negotiations, could result in a significant disruption of our operations or higher ongoing labor costs and could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects and harm our reputation.

 

48


Table of Contents

In addition, our employees may in the future elect to form unions and seek to bargain collectively. If employees at any of our sites become unionized, we may be required to raise wage levels or grant other benefits that could result in an increase in our compensation expenses, in which case our profitability may be adversely affected.

Our clients often dictate where they wish for us to locate the sites that serve their customers, such as “near-shore” jurisdictions located in close proximity to the United States or specific locations elsewhere in the world. There is no assurance that we will be able to find and secure locations suitable for operations in jurisdictions which meet our cost-effectiveness and security standards. Our inability to expand our operations to such locations, however, may impact our ability to secure new and additional business from clients, and could adversely affect our growth and results of operations.

We may fail to attract, hire, train and retain sufficient numbers of skilled employees in a timely fashion at our sites to support our operations, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Our business relies on large numbers of trained and skilled employees at our sites, and our success depends to a significant extent on our ability to attract, hire, train and retain skilled employees. The outsourcing industry as well as the technology industry generally experience high employee turnover. In addition, we compete for skilled employees not only with other companies in our industry, but also with companies in other industries, such as social media, meal delivery and transport, e-commerce and fintech, among others. Increased competition for these employees, in our industry or otherwise, particularly in tight labor markets, could have an adverse effect on our business. Additionally, a significant increase in the turnover rate among trained employees could increase our costs and decrease our operating profit margins and could have an adverse effect on our ability to complete existing contracts in a timely manner, meet client objectives and expand our business.

In addition, our ability to maintain and renew existing client engagements, obtain new business and increase our margins will depend, in large part, on our ability to attract, hire, train and retain employees with skills that enable us to keep pace with growing demands for outsourcing, evolving industry standards, new technology applications and changing client preferences. Our failure to attract, train and retain personnel with the experience and skills necessary to fulfill the needs of our existing and future clients or to assimilate new employees successfully into our operations could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

In particular, competition for qualified employees, particularly in the United States, Philippines, India, Mexico and Taiwan, remains high and we expect such competition to continue. In many locations in which we operate, there is a limited pool of employees who have the skills and training needed to do our work. If our business continues to grow, the number of people we will need to hire will increase. We will also need to increase our hiring if we are not able to effectively manage our employee attrition rate. Significant competition for employees could have an adverse effect on our ability to expand our business and service our clients, as well as cause us to incur greater personnel expenses and training costs.

The inelasticity of our labor costs relative to short-term movements in client demand could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our business depends on maintaining large numbers of employees to service our clients’ business needs, and we prefer not to terminate employees on short notice in response to temporary declines in demand in excess of agreed levels, as rehiring and retraining employees at a later date would force us to incur additional expenses, and any termination of our employees would also involve the incurrence of significant additional costs in the form of severance payments to comply with labor regulations in the various jurisdictions in which we operate our business, all of which would have an adverse impact on our operating profit margins. Additionally, the hiring and training of our employees in response to increased demand takes time and results in additional short term expenses. These factors constrain our ability to adjust our labor costs for short-term movements in demand, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

 

49


Table of Contents

There may be adverse tax and employment law consequences if the independent contractor status of some of our personnel or the exempt status of our employees is successfully challenged.

In several countries, a small number of our personnel are retained as independent contractors. The criteria to determine whether an individual is considered an independent contractor or an employee are typically fact sensitive and vary by jurisdiction, as can the interpretation of the applicable laws. If a government authority or court makes any adverse determination with respect to independent contractors in general or one or more of our independent contractors specifically, we could incur significant costs, including for prior periods, in respect of tax withholding, social security taxes or payments, workers’ compensation and unemployment contributions, and recordkeeping, or we may be required to modify our business model, any of which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations and increase the difficulty in attracting and retaining personnel.

Risks Related to Our Clients and Client Contracts

If our clients decide to enter into or further expand insourcing activities in the future, or if current trends toward outsourcing services and/or outsourcing activities are reversed, it may materially adversely affect our business, results of operations, financial condition and prospects.

Our current agreements with our clients do not prevent our clients from insourcing services that are currently outsourced to us, and none of our clients have entered into any non-compete agreements with us. Our current clients may seek to insource services similar to those we provide. Any decision by our clients to enter into or further expand insourcing activities in the future could cause us to lose a significant volume of business and may materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Moreover, the trend towards outsourcing business processes may not continue and could be reversed by factors beyond our control, including negative perceptions attached to outsourcing activities or government regulations against outsourcing activities, or reduced costs from insourcing services, including as a result of technological developments or improvement in automation. Current or prospective clients may elect to perform such services in-house that may be associated with using an offshore provider. Political opposition to outsourcing services and/or outsourcing activities may also arise in certain countries if there is a perception that such actions have a negative effect on domestic employment opportunities.

In addition, our business may be adversely affected by potential new laws and regulations prohibiting or limiting outsourcing of certain core business activities of our clients in key jurisdictions in which we conduct our business, such as in the United States. The introduction of such laws and regulations or the change in interpretation of existing laws and regulations could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

The consolidation of our clients or potential clients may adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Consolidation of the potential users of our solutions, particularly those in the social media, on-demand, e-commerce and fintech industries, may decrease the number of clients who contract for our solutions. Any significant reduction in or elimination of the use of the solutions we provide as a result of consolidation would result in reduced revenue to us and could harm our business. Such consolidation may encourage clients to apply increasing pressure on us to lower the prices we charge for our solutions, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

The terms of our client contracts or inaccurate forecasting may limit our profitability or enable our clients to reduce or terminate their use of our solutions.

Some of our client contracts do not have minimum volume requirements, and the profitability of each client contract or work order may fluctuate, sometimes significantly, throughout various stages of the program. Further,

 

50


Table of Contents

clients in some cases do not accurately forecast their demand for our services, resulting in over-hiring for certain campaigns without the ability to charge the client for these excess headcount costs. Certain contracts have performance-related penalty provisions that require us to issue the client a credit based upon our failing to meet agreed-upon service levels and performance metrics. In addition, certain of our client contracts include provisions that subject us to potential liability and/or credits in certain circumstances. Moreover, although our objective is to sign multi-year agreements, our contracts generally allow the client to terminate the contract for convenience with advance notice or reduce their use of our solutions. There can be no assurance that our clients will not terminate their contracts before their scheduled expiration dates, that the volume of services for these programs will not be reduced, that we will be able to avoid penalties or earn performance bonuses for our solutions, or that we will be able to terminate unprofitable contracts without incurring significant liabilities. For these reasons, there can be no assurance that our client contracts will be profitable for us or that we will be able to achieve or maintain any particular level of profitability through our client contracts. In addition, these risks make it more difficult to predict our financial results in future periods.

We may be subject to liability claims if we breach our contracts, and our insurance may be inadequate to cover our losses.

We are subject to numerous obligations in our contracts with our clients. Despite the procedures, systems and internal controls we have implemented to comply with our contracts, on occasion we have in the past failed and may in the future fail to achieve these commitments, whether through a weakness in these procedures, systems and internal controls, negligence or the willful act of an employee or contractor, or other factors beyond our control, such as weaknesses in our clients’ systems and security. Our insurance policies, including our cyber and errors and omissions insurance, may be inadequate to compensate us for the potentially significant losses that may result from claims arising from breaches of our contracts (including breaches that result in the unauthorized access to systems or disclosure of data), disruptions in our services, failures or disruptions to our infrastructure, catastrophic events, the COVID-19 pandemic, disasters or otherwise. In addition, such insurance may not be available to us in the future on economically reasonable terms, or at all. Further, our insurance may not cover all claims made against us and defending a suit, regardless of its merit, could be costly and divert management’s attention.

In particular, our contracts with clients include obligations to satisfy certain performance indicators, such as average handle time, job count, productivity, total review time and accuracy. If we fail to meet such performance indicators, we could be obligated to reduce our clients’ payment under such contracts or our clients may have the right to terminate such contracts. The termination of our contracts with our clients and the resulting loss of clients due to our failure to meet performance indicators may have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations and may also harm our reputation.

If our current insurance coverage is or becomes insufficient to protect against losses incurred, our business, financial condition and results of operations may be adversely affected.

We provide services and solutions that are integral to our clients’ businesses. If we were to default in the provision of any contractually agreed-upon services or solutions, our clients could suffer significant damages and make claims against us for those damages. We currently carry cyber and errors and omissions liability coverage in an amount we consider appropriate for all of the services we provide. To the extent client damages are deemed recoverable against us in amounts substantially in excess of our insurance coverage, or if our claims for insurance coverage are denied by our insurance carriers for any reason, including reasons beyond our control, there could be a material adverse effect on our revenue, business, financial condition and results of operations.

Although we maintain professional liability insurance, product liability insurance, commercial general and property insurance, business interruption insurance, workers’ compensation coverage, and umbrella insurance for certain of our operations, our insurance coverage does not insure against all risks in our operations or all claims we may receive. Damage claims from clients or third parties brought against us or claims that we initiate due to a data security breach, the disruption of our business, litigation, or natural disasters, may not be covered by our

 

51


Table of Contents

insurance, may exceed the limits of our insurance coverage, and may result in substantial costs and diversion of resources even if insured. Some types of insurance are not available on reasonable terms or at all in some countries in which we operate, and we cannot insure against damage to our reputation. The assertion of one or more large claims against us, whether or not successful and whether or not insured, could materially adversely affect our reputation, business, financial condition and results of operations.

Risks Related to Intellectual Property and Technology

Others could claim that we infringe, violate, or misappropriate their intellectual property rights, which may result in substantial costs, diversion of resources and management attention and harm to our reputation.

Our success largely depends on our ability to use and develop our technology, tools, code, methodologies and services without infringing the intellectual property rights of third parties, including patents, copyrights, trade secrets and trademarks. We or our clients may be subject to claims that our services and solutions infringe, misappropriate, or violate the intellectual property rights of others. Any such claims, whether or not they have merit or are successful, may result in substantial costs, divert management attention and other resources, harm our reputation and prevent us from offering our solutions to clients. A successful infringement claim against us could materially and adversely affect our business, resulting in our being required to enter into license agreements (if available on commercially reasonable terms or at all), substitute inferior or costlier technologies into our solutions, pay monetary damages or royalties and/or comply with an injunction against providing some or all of our solutions to clients.

We also license software from third parties. Other parties may claim that our use of such licensed software infringes their intellectual property rights. Although we seek to secure indemnification protection from our software vendors to protect us against such claims, not all of our vendors agree to provide us with sufficient indemnification protection, and even in the instances where we do secure such protection, it is possible that such vendors may not honor those obligations or that we may have a costly dispute with a vendor over such obligations.

In our contracts, we agree to indemnify our clients for expenses and liabilities resulting from third parties claiming our solutions infringe, misappropriate, or violate their intellectual property rights, in some cases excluding third-party components. In some instances, the amount of these indemnity obligations may be greater than the revenues we receive from the client under the applicable contract. Further, our current and former employees and independent contractors could challenge our exclusive rights to the software and other technology they have developed in the course of their employment or engagement with us. In certain countries in which we operate, an employer is deemed to own the copyright in any work created by its employees during the course, and within the scope, of their employment, but the employer may be required to satisfy additional legal requirements in order to make further use of such works. While we believe that we have complied with all such requirements, and believe that we have fulfilled all requirements necessary to acquire all rights in software and technology developed by our employees and independent contractors, we cannot guarantee that all such requirements have been met, and even if they have, current and former employees and independent contractors could still challenge our exclusive rights in software and technology they have created, which could divert management attention and other resources and result in substantial cost. We may not be successful in defending against any claim by our current or former employees or independent contractors challenging our exclusive rights over the use of works those employees or independent contractors created, or their requesting additional compensation for our use of such works.

If we fail to adequately protect our intellectual property rights and proprietary information in the United States and abroad, our competitive position could be impaired and we may lose valuable assets, experience reduced revenues and incur costly litigation to protect our rights.

We believe that our success is dependent, in part, upon protecting our intellectual property rights and proprietary information, including trade secrets. We rely on a combination of intellectual property rights, including trademarks, copyright, trade secrets, contractual restrictions and technical measures to establish and

 

52


Table of Contents

protect our intellectual property rights and proprietary information. However, the steps we take to protect our intellectual property rights and proprietary information may provide only limited protection and may not now or in the future provide us with a competitive advantage. We may not be able to protect our intellectual property rights, if, for example, we do not detect unauthorized use of our intellectual property or do not have the resources to enforce our intellectual property rights. Any of our intellectual property rights may be challenged by others and could be invalidated through administrative process or litigation. Furthermore, legal standards relating to the validity, enforceability and scope of protection of intellectual property rights are uncertain. Despite our precautions, it may be possible for unauthorized third parties to copy our technology and use information that we regard as proprietary to create products and services that compete with our solutions, which may cause us to lose market share or render us unable to operate our business profitably. In addition, some contractual provisions protecting against unauthorized use, copying, transfer, and disclosure of our technology may be unenforceable under the laws of jurisdictions outside the United States. In addition, the laws of some countries do not protect intellectual property rights to the same extent as the laws of the United States, and as a result we may not be able to protect our technology and intellectual property in all jurisdictions in which we operate.

We enter into confidentiality and invention assignment agreements with our employees and consultants and enter into confidentiality agreements with our directors, advisory board members and with the parties with whom we have strategic relationships and business alliances, as well as our clients. We also enter into confidentiality agreements with third parties that receive access to our proprietary or confidential information. No assurance can be given that these agreements will be effective in controlling access to or the distribution of our proprietary information. Further, these agreements will not prevent potential competitors from independently developing technologies that may be substantially equivalent or superior to ours.

While our contracts with our clients provide that we retain the ownership rights to our pre-existing proprietary intellectual property, in some cases we may assign to clients intellectual property rights in and to some aspects of the work product developed specifically for these clients in connection with these projects. If we assign intellectual property rights to clients that may be more broadly useful in our business, that would limit or prevent our ability to use such intellectual property rights in our solutions.

We may be required to spend significant resources to monitor and protect our intellectual property rights. Litigation may be necessary in the future to enforce our intellectual property rights, including to protect our trade secrets. Such litigation could be costly, time consuming and distracting to management. Furthermore, our efforts to enforce our intellectual property rights may be met with defenses, counterclaims or countersuits attacking the validity and enforceability of our intellectual property rights. Our inability to protect our proprietary technology against unauthorized copying or use, as well as any costly litigation that we may enter into to protect and enforce our intellectual property rights, could make it more expensive for us to do business and adversely affect our operating results by delaying further sales or the implementation of our technologies, impairing the functionality of our solutions, delaying introductions of new features or applications or injuring our reputation.

Our solutions use open source software, and any failure to comply with the terms of one or more applicable open source licenses could adversely affect our business, subject us to litigation, and create potential liability.

Some of our solutions use software made available under open source licenses, and we expect to continue to incorporate open source software in our solutions in the future. Open source software is typically freely available, but is licensed under various requirements that bind the licensee. While the use of open source software may reduce development costs and speed up the development process, it may also present certain risks, that may be greater than those associated with the use of third-party commercial software. For example, open source software is generally provided without any warranties or other contractual protections regarding infringement or the quality of the code, including the existence of security vulnerabilities. We cannot guarantee we comply with all obligations under these licenses. If the owner of the copyright in the relevant open source software were to allege that we had not complied with the conditions of one or more open source licenses, we could be required to incur significant expenses defending against such allegations, may be subject to the payment of damages, enjoined from further use of the

 

53


Table of Contents

software, required to comply with conditions of the license (which may include releasing the source code of our proprietary software to third parties without charge), or forced to devote additional resources to re-engineer all or a portion of our solutions to avoid using the open source software. Any of these events could create liability for us, damage our reputation, and have an adverse effect on our revenue, and operations.

Our business relies heavily on owned and third-party technology and computer systems, which subjects us to various uncertainties.

We rely heavily on sophisticated and specialized communications and computer technology coupled with third-party telecommunications and bandwidth providers to provide high-quality and reliable real-time solutions on behalf of our clients through our sites. We rely on client relationship management and other systems and technology in our contact center operations. Our operations, therefore, depend on the proper functioning of our and third parties’ equipment and systems, including hardware and software. We also rely on the data services provided by local communication companies in the countries in which we operate as well as domestic and international service providers.

We may in the future experience system disruptions, outages, and other performance problems. These problems may be caused by a variety of factors, including infrastructure changes, vendor issues, software defects, human error, viruses, worms, security attacks (internal or external), fraud, spikes in customer usage, or denial of service attacks. In some instances, we may not be able to identify the cause or causes of these performance problems within an acceptable period of time. Because of the large amount of data that we collect and process in our systems, it is possible that these issues could result in data loss or corruption, or cause the data to be incomplete or contain inaccuracies that our clients, their customers and other users regard as significant. Furthermore, the availability or performance of our solutions could also be adversely affected by our clients’ and their customers’ and other users’ inability to access the internet. For example, our clients and their customers and other users access our solutions through their internet service providers. If a service provider fails to provide sufficient capacity to support our applications or otherwise experiences service outages, such failure could interrupt our clients’ and their customers’ and other users’ access to our applications, which could adversely affect their perception of our applications’ reliability and our revenues.

We seek to maintain sufficient capacity in our operations infrastructure to meet the needs of all of our clients and users, as well as our own needs, and to ensure that our services and solutions are accessible, including backup and redundancy mechanisms. Despite our efforts, any disruptions in the delivery of our services due to the failure of our systems, hardware or software, whether provided and maintained by third parties or our in-house teams, or due to interruptions in our data services or those of third parties that adversely affect the quality or reliability (or perceived quality or reliability) of our solutions or render us unable to handle increased volumes of client interaction during periods of high demand, may result in reduction in revenue, loss of clients, or require unexpected investments in new systems or technology to ensure that we can continue to provide high-quality and reliable solutions to our clients. These types of interruptions or failures could also adversely impact our timekeeping, scheduling, and workforce management applications, such as scheduling, forecasting and reporting applications and home build systems for employee timekeeping, scheduling and employee leave requests. The occurrence of any such interruption or unplanned investment could materially adversely affect our business, financial positions, operating results and prospects.

In addition, in some areas of our business, we depend upon the quality and reliability of the services and products of our clients which we help sell to their end customers. If the services and solutions we provide to our clients through their services and products experience technical difficulties or quality issues, our clients may face difficulties selling their services and products to their end customers and we may have a harder time selling services and solutions to our clients, which could have an adverse impact on our business and operating results.

We further anticipate that it will be necessary to continue to invest in our technology and communications infrastructure to ensure reliability and maintain our competitiveness. This is likely to result in significant ongoing

 

54


Table of Contents

capital expenditures for maintenance as well as growth as we continue to grow our business. There can be no assurance that any of our information systems will be adequate to meet our future needs or that we will be able to incorporate new technology to enhance and develop our existing solutions. Moreover, investments in technology, including future investments in upgrades and enhancements to hardware or software, may not necessarily maintain our competitiveness. Our future success will also depend in part on our ability to anticipate and develop information technology solutions that keep pace with evolving industry standards and changing client demands.

Our business prospects will suffer if we are unable to continue to anticipate our clients’ needs by adapting to market and technology trends.

Our success depends, in part, upon our ability to anticipate our clients’ needs by adapting to market and technology trends. We may need to invest significant resources in research and development to maintain and improve our solutions and respond to our clients’ changing needs. However, we may not be able to modify our current solutions or develop, introduce or integrate new solutions in a timely manner or on a cost-effective basis. If we are unable to further refine and enhance our solutions or to anticipate innovation opportunities and keep pace with evolving technologies, our solutions could become uncompetitive or obsolete and as a result our clients may terminate their relationship with us or choose to divert their business elsewhere, and our revenue may decline as a result. In addition, we may experience technical problems and additional costs as we introduce new solutions, deploy future iterations of our solutions and integrate new solutions with existing client systems and workflows. If any of these or related problems were to arise, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be adversely affected.

Our clients span numerous industry verticals, including social media, e-commerce, gaming, streaming media, food delivery and ride sharing, HiTech, FinTech and HealthTech. If we are unable to successfully adapt our solutions to these industry verticals, if we are not successful in attracting successful clients in these industry verticals, or if these industry verticals do not grow in line with our expectations, our potential growth opportunities could be compromised.

Risks Related to Legal, Regulatory and Tax Matters

We are subject to laws and regulations in the United States and other countries in which we operate, including export restrictions, economic sanctions, the FCPA, and similar anti-corruption laws. Compliance with these laws requires significant resources and non-compliance may result in civil or criminal penalties and other remedial measures.

We are subject to many laws and regulations that restrict our international operations, including laws that prohibit activities involving restricted countries, organizations, entities and persons that have been identified as unlawful actors or that are subject to U.S. sanctions. The U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), and other international bodies have imposed sanctions that prohibit us from engaging in trade or financial transactions with certain countries, businesses, organizations and individuals. We are also subject to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”), and anti-bribery and anti-corruption laws in other countries. The FCPA prohibits U.S. businesses and their representatives from offering to pay, paying, promising to pay or authorizing the payment of money or anything of value to a foreign official in order to influence any act or decision of the foreign official in his or her official capacity or to secure any other improper advantage in order to obtain or retain business. The FCPA also obligates companies whose securities are listed in the United States to comply with accounting provisions requiring us to maintain books and records, which in reasonable detail, accurately and fairly reflect the transactions and dispositions of the assets of the corporation, including international subsidiaries, if any, and to devise and maintain a system of internal accounting controls sufficient to provide reasonable assurances regarding the reliability of financial reporting and the preparation of financial statements. Globally, other countries have enacted anti-bribery and anti-corruption laws similar to the FCPA, such as the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act in the Philippines and the U.K. Bribery Act 2010, all of which prohibit companies and their intermediaries from bribing government officials for the purpose of obtaining or keeping

 

55


Table of Contents

business or otherwise obtaining favorable treatment. We operate in many parts of the world that have experienced government corruption to some degree, and, in certain circumstances, strict compliance with anti-bribery laws may conflict with local customs and practices, although adherence to local customs and practices is generally not a defense under U.S. and other anti-bribery laws.

Our compliance program contains controls and procedures designed to ensure our compliance with the FCPA, OFAC and other sanctions, and laws and regulations. The continuing implementation and ongoing development and monitoring of our compliance program is time consuming and expensive, and could result in the discovery of compliance issues or violations by us or our employees, independent contractors, subcontractors or agents of which we were previously unaware. In addition, due to uncertainties and complexities in the regulatory environment, we cannot assure you that regulators will interpret laws and regulations the same way we do, or that we will always be in full compliance with applicable laws and regulations.

Any violations of these or other laws, regulations and procedures by our employees, independent contractors, subcontractors and agents, including third parties we associate with or companies we acquire, could expose us to administrative, civil or criminal penalties, fines or business restrictions, which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations and financial condition and would adversely affect our reputation and the market for shares of our Class A common stock and may require certain of our investors to disclose their investment in us under certain state laws.

Litigation or legal proceedings could expose us to significant liabilities and have a negative impact on our reputation or business.

From time to time, we have been and may in the future be party to various claims and litigation proceedings, including class actions. We evaluate these claims and litigation proceedings to assess the likelihood of unfavorable outcomes and to estimate, if possible, the amount of potential losses. Based on these assessments and estimates, we establish reserves, as appropriate. These assessments and estimates are based on the information available to management at the time and involve a significant amount of management judgment. Although we are not currently party to any litigation that we consider material, actual outcomes or losses may differ materially from our assessments and estimates.

Even when these claims are not meritorious, the defense of these claims may divert our management’s attention, and may result in significant expenses. The results of litigation and other legal proceedings are inherently uncertain, and adverse judgments or settlements in some of these legal disputes may result in adverse monetary damages, penalties or injunctive relief against us, which could have a material adverse effect on our financial position, cash flows or results of operations. Any claims or litigation, even if fully indemnified or insured, could damage our reputation and make it more difficult to compete effectively or to obtain adequate insurance in the future.

Furthermore, while we maintain insurance for certain potential liabilities, such insurance does not cover all types and amounts of potential liabilities and is subject to various exclusions as well as caps on amounts recoverable. Even if we believe a claim is covered by insurance, insurers may dispute our entitlement to recovery for a variety of potential reasons, which may affect the timing and, if the insurers prevail, the amount of our recovery.

Our global operations expose us to numerous legal and regulatory requirements and failure to comply with such requirements, including unexpected changes to such requirements, could adversely affect our results of operations.

We service our clients’ customers around the world. We are subject to numerous, and sometimes conflicting, legal regimes of the United States and foreign national, state and provincial authorities on matters as diverse as anti-corruption, content requirements, trade restrictions, tariffs, taxation, sanctions, immigration,

 

56


Table of Contents

internal and disclosure control obligations, securities regulation, anti-competition, data security, privacy, labor relations, wages and severance, and health care requirements. For example, our operations in the United States are, and our operations outside of the United States may also be, subject to U.S. laws on these diverse matters. U.S. laws may be different in significant respects from the laws of the Philippines and India, where we have significant operations, and jurisdictions where we seek to expand. We also have expanded and may seek to expand operations in emerging market jurisdictions where legal systems are less developed or familiar to us. In addition, there can be no assurance that the laws or administrative practices relating to taxation (including the current position as to income and withholding taxes), foreign exchange, export controls, economic sanctions or otherwise in the jurisdictions where we have operations will not change. In addition, changes in tax laws in some jurisdictions may have an retroactive effect and we may be found to have paid less tax than required in such regions. For instance, the Income-tax Act of India was changed recently which included a retroactive effect going back to 1962. Compliance with diverse legal requirements is costly, time consuming and requires significant resources. Violations of one or more of these regulations in the conduct of our business could result in significant fines, criminal sanctions against us or our officers, prohibitions on doing business and damage to our reputation. Violations of these regulations in connection with the performance of our obligations to our clients also could result in liability for significant monetary damages, fines or criminal prosecution, unfavorable publicity and other reputational damage, restrictions on our ability to process information and allegations by our clients that we have not performed our contractual obligations. Due to the varying degrees of development of the legal systems of the countries in which we operate, local laws might be insufficient to protect our rights.

We are subject to economic sanctions, export control, anti-corruption, anti-bribery, and similar laws. Non-compliance with such laws can subject us to criminal or civil liability and harm our business, revenues, financial condition and results of operations.

Although we take precautions to prevent our services from being provided or deployed in violation of such laws, our services could be provided inadvertently in violation of such laws despite the precautions we take, including usage by our clients in violation of our terms of service. We also cannot assure you that our employees and agents will not take actions in violation of our policies and applicable law, for which we may be ultimately held responsible, including entering into contracts or agreements with third parties without our knowledge or consent that would result in such violation. If we fail to comply with these laws, we and our employees could be subject to civil or criminal penalties, including the possible loss of export privileges, monetary penalties, and, in extreme cases, imprisonment of responsible employees for knowing and willful violations of these laws. We may also be adversely affected through penalties, reputational harm, loss of access to certain markets, or otherwise.

In addition, various countries regulate the import and export of certain encryption and other technology, including import and export permitting and licensing requirements, and have enacted laws that could limit our ability to distribute our services and solutions or could limit our users’ ability to access our services and solutions in those countries. Changes in our services and solutions, or future changes in export and import regulations may prevent our users with international operations from utilizing our services and solutions globally or, in some cases, prevent the export or import of our services and solutions to certain countries, governments, or persons altogether. Any change in export or import regulations, economic sanctions, or related legislation, or change in the countries, governments, persons, or technologies targeted by such regulations, could result in decreased use of our services and solutions by, or in our decreased ability to export or sell services and solutions to, existing or potential users with international operations. Any decreased use of our platform or limitation on our ability to export or sell our services and solutions would likely adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

We cannot predict whether any material suits, claims, or investigations may arise in the future. Regardless of the outcome of any future actions, claims, or investigations, we may incur substantial defense costs and such actions may cause a diversion of management time and attention. Also, it is possible that we may be required to pay substantial damages or settlement costs which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

 

57


Table of Contents

From time to time, some of our employees spend significant amounts of time at our client’s sites, often in foreign jurisdictions, which expose us to certain risks.

Some of our projects require a portion of the work to be undertaken at our clients’ facilities, which are often located outside our employees’ country of residence. The ability of our employees to work in locations around the world may depend on their ability to obtain the required visas and work permits, and this process can be lengthy and difficult. Immigration laws are subject to legislative change, as well as to variations in standards of application and enforcement due to political forces and economic conditions and international travel, which may be adversely affected by regional or global circumstances or travel restrictions also affects our employees’ ability to work in foreign jurisdictions. In addition, we may become subject to taxation in jurisdictions where we would not otherwise be so subject as a result of the amount of time that our employees spend in any such jurisdiction in any given year. While we seek to monitor the number of days that our employees spend in each country to avoid subjecting ourselves to any such taxation, there can be no assurance that we will be successful in these efforts.

Our business operations and financial condition could be adversely affected by negative publicity about offshore outsourcing or anti-outsourcing legislation in the countries in which our clients operate.

Concerns that offshore outsourcing has resulted in a loss of jobs and sensitive technologies and information to foreign countries have led to negative publicity concerning outsourcing in some countries. Many organizations and public figures in the United States and Europe have publicly expressed concern about a perceived association between offshore outsourcing IT service providers and the loss of jobs in their home countries.

Current or prospective clients may elect to perform services that we offer, or may be discouraged from transferring these services to offshore providers such as ourselves, to avoid any negative perceptions that may be associated with using an offshore provider or for data privacy and security concerns. As a result, our ability to compete effectively with competitors that operate primarily out of facilities located in these countries could be harmed.

Governments and industry organizations may also adopt new laws, regulations or requirements, or make changes to existing laws or regulations, that could impact the demand for, or value of, our services. If we are unable to adapt the solutions we deliver to our clients to changing legal and regulatory standards or other requirements in a timely manner, or if our solutions fail to allow our clients to comply with applicable laws and regulations, our clients may lose confidence in our services and could switch to services offered by our competitors, or threaten or bring legal actions against us.

Increases in income tax rates, changes in income tax laws or disagreements with tax authorities could adversely affect our business, financial condition or results of operations.

We are subject to income taxes in the United States and in certain foreign jurisdictions in which we operate. Increases in income tax rates or other changes in income tax laws in any particular jurisdiction could reduce our after-tax income from such jurisdictions and could adversely affect our business, financial condition or results of operations. Our operations outside the United States generate a significant portion of our income and many of the other countries in which we have significant operations, have recently made or are actively considering changes to existing tax laws. For example, in December 2017, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (“TCJA”) was signed into law in the United States. While our accounting for the recorded impact of the TCJA is deemed to be complete, these amounts are based on prevailing regulations and currently available information, and any additional guidance issued by the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) could impact our recorded amounts in future periods.

The TCJA imposed a new tax assessed on indirect foreign earnings, known as the global intangible low- taxed income tax (the “GILTI”) and a new minimum tax known as the base-erosion anti-abuse tax (the “BEAT”). The GILTI aims to tax a U.S. shareholder’s share of the income of controlled foreign corporations in excess of their tangible business property returns, while the BEAT imposes a minimum tax on certain taxpayers that make deductible “base erosion” payments to foreign related parties. We are currently evaluating the applicability of the GILTI and BEAT taxes to us.

 

58


Table of Contents

Additional changes in the U.S. tax regime or in how U.S. multinational corporations are taxed on foreign earnings, including changes in how existing tax laws are interpreted or enforced, could adversely affect our business, financial condition or results of operations.

We cannot predict the outcome of any specific legislative proposals or amendments to existing treaties. Since we operate or have operations in a number of foreign jurisdictions, our plans for expansion or our results of operations in such jurisdictions could be adversely affected if any adopted proposals resulted in an increase in our tax burden, costs of our tax compliance or otherwise adversely affected our results of operations and cash flows. There are no assurances that we will be able to implement effective tax planning strategies that are necessary to optimize our tax position following changes in tax laws globally. Our effective tax rate and our results of operations may be impacted by any changes in tax laws.

In addition, we are subject to periodic examination of our income tax returns by the IRS and other tax authorities around the world. There can be no assurance that the outcomes from these examinations will not have an adverse effect on our provision for income taxes and cash tax liability.

If our favorable tax treatment is overturned, we may be subject to significant penalties.

Several of our sites, primarily located in the Philippines, benefit from tax incentives or concessional rates provided by local laws and regulations. Several of our sites located within special economic zones in the Philippines benefit from favorable tax treatment provided by registrations with the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (“PEZA”). These benefits vary from site to site and may include income tax holidays, reduced income taxes, and reduced VAT. Under the PEZA registrations, favorable tax treatment for certain of our PEZA-registered sites has expired, but may be renewed for subsequent periods provided we meet certain criteria for Net Foreign Exchange Earnings (“NFEE”) and Capital Equipment Labor Ratio (“CELR”). The income tax holiday for three of our sites expired in July 2019 and can be extended through July 2021, for two of our sites expired in December 2019 and can be extended through December 2021, and for two of our sites expired in November 2020 and can be extended through November 2022. We believe that we continue to meet the necessary criteria for favorable tax treatment and will file the extension applications before each respective due date.

The favorable tax treatment under PEZA registrations decreased foreign taxes by $6.5 million and $4.3 million for the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019, respectively. If the PEZA extension was not granted, we would have incurred $2.9 million of cumulative tax payable and a $3.9 million increase in deferred tax assets as of the year ended December 31, 2020. More generally, future changes in tax incentives or concessional rates provided by local laws and regulation could require us to pay a significant tax liability, and we may have not the available cash or borrowing capacity to make the payments, which could materially impair our ability to conduct our business.

Risks Related to Finance and Accounting

Our profitability will suffer if we are not able to maintain asset utilization levels, price appropriately and control our costs.

Our profitability is largely a function of the efficiency with which we utilize our assets, particularly our people and sites, and the pricing that we are able to obtain for our solutions. Our utilization rates are affected by a number of factors, including our ability to transition employees from completed projects to new assignments, hire and assimilate new employees, forecast demand for our services and solutions and thereby maintain an appropriate headcount in each of our locations and geographies, manage attrition, accommodate our clients’ requests to shift the mix of delivery locations during the pendency of a contract, and manage resources for training, professional development and other typically non-billable activities. In addition, we rely in part on our clients’ own forecasts when we forecast demand for our services and solutions, and we have in the past experienced, and may in the future experience, substantial variation from these forecasts in our clients’ actual

 

59


Table of Contents

demand. If we are unable to manage our asset utilization levels, there could be a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

The pricing of our services and solutions is usually included in statements of work entered into with our clients. We may not accurately price certain contracts to reflect the true cost of providing services. In certain cases, we have committed to pricing with limited to no sharing of risks regarding inflation and currency exchange rates. In addition, we are obligated under some of our contracts to deliver productivity benefits to our clients, such as reduction in handle time or response time. The prices we are able to charge for our solutions are affected by a number of factors, including our clients’ perceptions of our ability to add value through our solutions, competition, introduction of new services or solutions by us or our competitors, our ability to accurately estimate, attain and sustain revenues from client engagements, margins and cash flows over increasingly longer contract periods and general economic and political conditions. If we fail to accurately estimate future wage inflation rates, unhedged currency exchange rates or our costs, or if we fail to accurately estimate the productivity benefits we can achieve under a contract, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our profitability is also a function of our ability to control our costs and improve our efficiency. As we increase the number of our employees and grow our business, we may not be able to manage a significantly larger and more geographically diverse workforce and our profitability may suffer. Our cost management strategies also include improving the alignment between the demand for our services and our resource capacity, including our contact center utilization; the costs of service delivery; the cost of sales and general and administrative costs as a percentage of revenues; and the use of process automation for standard operating tasks. If we are not effective in managing our operating and administrative costs in response to changes in demand and pricing for our services, or if we are unable to absorb or pass on to our clients the increases in our costs of operations, our results of operations could be materially adversely affected.

Our operating results may fluctuate from quarter to quarter due to various factors.

Our operating results may vary significantly from one quarter to the next and our business may be impacted by factors such as client loss, the timing of new contracts and of new service or solution offerings, termination of existing contracts, variations in the volume of business from clients resulting from changes in our clients’ operations, the business decisions of our clients regarding the use of our solutions, start-up costs, delays or difficulties in expanding our operating sites and infrastructure, delays or difficulties in recruiting, changes to our revenue mix or to our pricing structure or that of our competitors, inaccurate estimates of resources and time required to complete ongoing projects, currency fluctuation and seasonal changes in the operations of our clients. The financial benefit of gaining a new client may not be recognized at the intended time due to delays in the implementation of our solutions or negatively impacted due to an increase in the start-up costs. These factors may cause differences in revenues and income among the various quarters of any financial year, which means that the individual quarters of a year may not be predictive of our financial results in any other period.

Portions of our business have long sales cycles and long implementation cycles, which require significant resources and working capital.

Many of our client contracts are entered into after long sales cycles, which require a significant investment of capital, resources and time by both our clients and us. Before committing to use our services and solutions, potential clients require us to expend substantial time and resources educating them as to the value of our services and solutions and assessing the feasibility of integrating our systems and processes with theirs. As a result, our selling cycle, which may continue for multiple years, is subject to many risks and delays over which we have little or no control, including our clients’ decisions to choose alternatives to our solutions (such as other providers or in-house resources) and the timing of our clients’ budget cycles and approval processes.

 

60


Table of Contents

In addition, implementing our services and solutions involves a significant commitment of resources over an extended period of time from both our clients and us. Our clients may also experience delays in obtaining internal approvals or may face delays associated with technology or system implementations, thereby further delaying the implementation process.

If we fail to close sales with potential clients to whom we have devoted significant time and resources, or if our current and future clients are not willing or able to invest the time and resources necessary to implement our services and solutions, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could suffer.

If we are unable to fund our working capital requirements and new investments, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be adversely affected.

Similar to our competitors in this industry, we incur significant start-up costs related to investments in infrastructure to provide our solutions and the hiring and training of employees, such expenses historically being incurred before revenues are generated.

We are exposed to adverse changes in our clients’ payment policies. If our key clients implement policies which extend the payment terms of our invoices, our working capital levels could be adversely affected and our financing costs may increase. If we are unable to fund our working capital requirements, access financing at competitive rates or make investments to meet the expanding business of our existing and potential new clients, our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could be adversely affected.

Our cash flows and results of operations may be adversely affected if we are unable to collect on billed and unbilled receivables from clients.

Our business depends on our ability to effectively bill and successfully obtain payment from our clients of the amounts they owe us for work performed. We evaluate the financial condition of our clients and usually bill and collect on relatively short cycles. We maintain provisions against receivables. Actual losses on client balances could differ from those that we currently anticipate and, as a result, we may need to adjust our provisions. In addition, our assessment of the creditworthiness of our clients may differ from the actual creditworthiness of those clients at the time of such assessment. Macroeconomic conditions, such as a potential credit crisis in the global financial system and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, have resulted in financial difficulties for some of our clients and could result in financial difficulties of other clients, including limited access to the credit markets, insolvency or bankruptcy. Such conditions have caused some clients and could cause other clients to delay payment, request modifications of their payment terms, or default on their payment obligations to us, all of which could increase our receivables balance. Timely collection of fees for client services depends on our ability to complete our contractual commitments and subsequently effectively bill for and collect our contractual service fees. If we are unable to meet our contractual obligations or effectively prepare and provide invoices, including as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, we might experience delays in the collection of or be unable to collect our client balances, which would adversely affect our results of operations and could adversely affect our cash flows. In addition, if we experience an increase in the time required to bill and collect for our services or if our clients are delayed in making payments or stop payments altogether, our cash flows could be adversely affected, which in turn could adversely affect our ability to make necessary investments and, therefore, could affect our results of operations.

During weak economic periods, there is an increased risk that our clients will file for bankruptcy protection, which may harm our revenue, profitability, and results of operations. For example, in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic, certain of our former clients have filed for bankruptcy protection under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. Although we have filed claims for payment of amounts we are owed in these cases, we may not ultimately recover amounts owed from these clients in bankruptcy proceedings. We also face risk from international clients that file for bankruptcy protection in foreign jurisdictions, particularly given that the application of foreign bankruptcy laws may be more difficult to predict. In addition, we may determine that the

 

61


Table of Contents

cost of pursuing any creditor claim outweighs the recovery potential of such claim. As a result, increases in client bankruptcy during weak economic periods could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and cash flows.

We are subject to risks associated with our incurrence of debt.

On September 25, 2019, we entered into the 2019 Credit Agreement providing for the $210.0 million Term Loan Facility and the $40.0 million Revolving Credit Facility (each as defined in “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness”). On April 30, 2021, we entered into Amendment No. 1 to the 2019 Credit Agreement to increase the committed size of the Revolving Credit Facility to $90.0 million. See “Summary—Recent Developments—Amendment to Our 2019 Credit Agreement.” The 2019 Credit Facilities (as defined in “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness”) mature on September 25, 2024. We expect to refinance, renew or replace the 2019 Credit Facilities prior to their maturity in September 2024 or to repay the 2019 Credit Facilities with cash from operations. An inability to refinance our 2019 Credit Facilities prior to maturity could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations, cash flow, capital resources and liquidity. See “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness” and “Description of Certain Indebtedness—Senior Secured Credit Facilities” for more information on our 2019 Credit Facilities.

Although we currently believe that we will be able to obtain any necessary amendment or refinancing of our 2019 Credit Facilities at a reasonable cost, there can be no assurance that we will succeed in obtaining such amendment or refinancing on favorable terms, if at all, which could significantly increase our future interest expense and adversely impact our liquidity and results of operations.

Further, an increase to our level of indebtedness could:

 

   

require us to dedicate a portion of our cash flow from operations to payments on our indebtedness, which could reduce the availability of cash flow to fund acquisitions, start-ups, working capital, capital expenditures and other general corporate purposes;

 

   

limit our ability to borrow money or sell stock for working capital, capital expenditures, debt service requirements and other purposes;

 

   

limit our flexibility in planning for, and reacting to, changes in our industry or business;

 

   

make us more vulnerable to unfavorable economic or business conditions; and

 

   

limit our ability to make acquisitions or take advantage of other business opportunities.

In the event we incur additional indebtedness, the risks described above could increase.

Indebtedness under our 2019 Credit Agreement bears interest based on the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”), which may be subject to regulatory guidance and/or reform that could cause interest rates under our current or future debt agreements to perform differently than in the past or cause other unanticipated consequences.

The ICE Benchmark Administration, the administrator of LIBOR, announced on March 5, 2021 that it intends to cease publication of LIBOR rates (i) with respect to U.S. dollar LIBOR with interest periods of 1 week and 2 months, after December 31, 2021 and (ii) with respect to U.S. dollar LIBOR with all other interest periods, after June 30, 2023, and as a result, methods of calculating LIBOR are evolving. If LIBOR ceases to exist or if the methods of calculating LIBOR change from their current form, we may need to renegotiate the terms of our 2019 Credit Agreement to replace LIBOR with the new standard that is established, if any, or to otherwise agree with the agent under such facilities on a new means of calculating interest. As of the date of this annual report we cannot reasonably estimate the expected impact on our business of the discontinuation of LIBOR.

 

62


Table of Contents

We may be unable to raise additional capital, which could harm our ability to compete.

As of March 31, 2021, we had cash and cash equivalents of $135.5 million. Even if this offering is successful, we may need additional funding to fund our operations, but additional funds, including late stage venture capitalist funding, may not be available to us on acceptable terms and on a timely basis, if at all. We may seek funds through borrowings or through additional rounds of financing, including private or public equity or debt offerings. Our future capital requirements will depend on many factors, including:

 

   

the expenses needed to attract, hire and retain skilled personnel;

 

   

the costs associated with being a public company;

 

   

the duration and severity of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on our business and financial markets generally; and

 

   

the extent to which we acquire or invest in businesses, products or technologies, although we currently have no commitments or agreements relating to any of these types of transactions.

If we raise additional funds through further issuances of equity or convertible debt securities, our existing stockholders could suffer significant dilution, and any new equity securities we issue could have rights, preferences, and privileges superior to those of holders of our Class A common stock. If we are unable to obtain adequate financing or financing on terms satisfactory to us, when we require it, our ability to continue to pursue our business objectives and to respond to business opportunities, challenges, or unforeseen circumstances could be significantly limited, and our business, financial condition and results of operations could be materially adversely affected. In addition, as a condition to providing additional funds to us, future investors may demand, and may be granted, rights superior to those of existing stockholders.

Debt financing, if available, is likely to involve restrictive covenants limiting our flexibility in conducting future business activities, and, in the event of insolvency, debt holders would be repaid before holders of our equity securities receive any distribution of our corporate assets. We also could be required to seek funds through arrangements with partners or others that may require us to relinquish rights or jointly own some aspects of our technologies or products that we would otherwise pursue on our own.

We track certain operational metrics with internal systems and tools and do not independently verify such metrics. Certain of our operational metrics are subject to inherent challenges in measurement, and real or perceived inaccuracies in such metrics may harm our reputation and negatively affect our business.

We track certain operational metrics, including key metrics such as net revenue retention rate, cNPS, eNPS, win rate, fill rate, internal referral rate and seat turn, with internal systems and tools that are not independently verified by any third party and 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 have 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 the 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, or if survey respondents are uncertain as to the confidentiality of their responses, the data we report may not be accurate. While these numbers are based on what we believe to be reasonable estimates of our metrics for the applicable period of measurement, there are inherent challenges and uncertainties in measuring these metrics. In addition, some of these metrics, such as win rate, are expected to fluctuate significantly from period to period based on timing of one or more client purchase decisions or other factors, which makes it difficult for us to accurately predict such metrics for any future period. Furthermore, we calculate our win rate on the basis of the total estimated annual revenue value for “won” and “lost” opportunities, which requires us to make judgments about the expected future revenue value of our client contracts at the time of such contracts, as well as the expected future revenue value of opportunities closed as “lost.” These estimates for our “won” opportunities are not updated based on events that occur subsequent to entering into such contracts and do

 

63


Table of Contents

not account for the possibility that our clients may terminate such contracts for convenience with advance notice or reduce their use of our solutions. Limitations or errors with respect to how we measure data or with respect to the data that we measure may affect our understanding of certain details of our business, which could affect our long-term strategies. If our operating metrics are not accurate representations of our business, or if investors do not perceive our operating metrics to be accurate, or if we discover material inaccuracies with respect to these figures, our reputation may be significantly harmed, and our operating and financial results could be adversely affected. Our operating metrics are not necessarily indicative of the historical performance of our business or the results that may be expected for any future period.

Our sites operate on leasehold property, and our inability to renew our leases on commercially acceptable terms or at all may adversely affect our results of operations.

Our sites operate on leasehold property. Our leases are subject to renewal and we may be unable to renew such leases on commercially acceptable terms or at all. Our inability to renew our leases, or a renewal of our leases with a rental rate higher than the prevailing rate under the applicable lease prior to expiration, may have an adverse impact on our operations, including disrupting our operations or increasing our cost of operations. In addition, in the event of non-renewal of our leases, we may be unable to locate suitable replacement properties for our sites or we may experience delays in relocation that could lead to a disruption in our operations. This has been further augmented by the COVID-19 pandemic where the commercial real estate industry, including our landlords, are experiencing tenants requesting rent abatements and reductions, which could lead to an increase in tenant evictions and vacant spaces, difficulty exiting existing leases and landlord bankruptcies.

Risks Related to this Offering and Ownership of our Class A Common Stock

Our Sponsor and our Co-Founders control us and their interests may conflict with ours or yours in the future.

Immediately following this offering, our Sponsor and our Co-Founders will beneficially own approximately 98.5% of the combined voting power of our Class A common stock and Class B common stock (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full). Moreover, we will agree to nominate to our board individuals designated by our Sponsor and our Co-Founders in accordance with the stockholders agreement we intend to enter into in connection with this offering. Our Sponsor and our Co-Founders will retain the right to designate directors subject to the maintenance of certain ownership requirements in us. See “Certain Relationships and Related Person Transactions—Stockholders Agreement.” Even when our Sponsor and our Co-Founders cease to own shares of our stock representing a majority of the total voting power, for so long as our Sponsor and Co-Founders continue to own a significant percentage of our stock, they will still be able to significantly influence or effectively control the composition of our board of directors and the approval of actions requiring stockholder approval through their voting power. Accordingly, for such period of time, our Sponsor and our Co-Founders will have significant influence with respect to our management, business plans and policies, including the appointment and removal of our officers. In particular, for so long as our Sponsor continues to own a significant percentage of our stock, our Sponsor will be able to cause or prevent a change of control of our company or a change in the composition of our board of directors and could preclude any unsolicited acquisition of our company. The concentration of ownership could deprive you of an opportunity to receive a premium for your shares of Class A common stock as part of a sale of our company and ultimately might affect the market price of our Class A common stock.

The dual class structure of our common stock will have the effect of concentrating voting control with those stockholders who held our common stock prior to the completion of this offering, and it may depress the trading price of our Class A common stock.

Our Class A common stock, which is the stock we are offering in this offering, has one vote per share and our Class B common stock has ten votes per share. Following this offering, our Sponsor and Co-Founders will hold in the aggregate 98.5% of the combined voting power of our Class A common stock and our Class B

 

64


Table of Contents

common stock (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full). Because of the ten-to-one voting ratio between our Class B and Class A common stock, the holders of our Class B common stock collectively will continue to control a majority of the combined voting power of our common stock and therefore be able to control all matters submitted to our stockholders for approval so long as the shares of Class B common stock represent at least 9.1% of all outstanding shares of our Class A and Class B common stock. Each share of our Class B common stock may be convertible into one share of our Class A common stock at any time and will convert automatically upon certain transfers and upon the earlier of (i) seven years from the filing and effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation in connection with this offering and (ii) (x) with respect to our Sponsor, the first date on which the aggregate number of outstanding shares of our Class B common stock held by our Sponsor ceases to represent at least 5.0% of the aggregate number of our outstanding shares of common stock and (y) with respect to each Co-Founder, the first date on which the aggregate number of shares of our Class B common stock held by such Co-Founder ceases to represent at least 5.0% of the aggregate number of our outstanding shares of common stock. This concentrated control will limit or preclude your ability 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 common stock that you may feel are in your best interest as one of our stockholders.

Future transfers or sales by holders of Class B common stock will generally result in those shares converting to Class A common stock, except for certain transfers described in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, including transfers effected for estate planning purposes where sole dispositive power and exclusive voting control with respect to the shares of Class B common stock is retained by the transferring holder. See the section titled “Description of Capital Stock—Conversion of Class B Common Stock” for additional information about conversions. The conversion of Class B common stock to Class A common stock will have the effect, over time, of increasing the relative voting power of those individual holders of Class B common stock who retain their shares in the long term.

In addition, we cannot predict whether our dual class structure will result in a lower or more volatile market price of our Class A common stock, in adverse publicity or other adverse consequences. Certain index providers have announced restrictions on including companies with multiple class share structures in certain of their indices. For example, S&P Dow Jones has stated that companies with multiple share classes will not be eligible for inclusion in the S&P Composite 1500 (composed of the S&P 500, S&P MidCap 400 and S&P SmallCap 600), although existing index constituents in July 2017 were grandfathered. Under the announced policies, our dual class capital structure would make us ineligible for inclusion in any of these indices. Given the sustained flow of investment funds into passive strategies that seek to track certain indices, exclusion from stock indices would likely preclude investment by many of these funds and could make our Class A common stock less attractive to other investors. As a result, the market price of our Class A common stock could be materially adversely affected.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will not limit the ability of our Sponsor to compete with us, and our Sponsor may have investments in businesses whose interests conflict with ours.

Our Sponsor and its affiliates engage in a broad spectrum of activities, including investments in the businesses that may compete with us. In the ordinary course of their business activities, our Sponsor and its affiliates may engage in activities where their interests conflict with our interests or those of our stockholders. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that none of our Sponsor, any of its affiliates or any director who is not employed by us (including any non-employee director who serves as one of our officers in both his or her director and officer capacities) or his or her affiliates will have any duty to refrain from engaging, directly or indirectly, in the same business activities or similar business activities or lines of business in which we operate. Our Sponsor also may pursue acquisition opportunities that may be complementary to our business, and, as a result, those acquisition opportunities may not be available to us. In addition, our Sponsor may have an interest in our pursuing acquisitions, divestitures and other transactions that, in its judgment, could enhance its investment, even though such transactions might involve risks to us and our stockholders.

 

65


Table of Contents

Upon the listing of our shares on Nasdaq, we will be a “controlled company” within the meaning of the rules of Nasdaq and, as a result, will qualify for, and intend to rely on, exemptions from certain corporate governance requirements. You will not have the same protections afforded to stockholders of companies that are subject to such requirements.

After the completion of this offering, our Sponsor and our Co-Founders will be parties to a stockholders agreement described in “Certain Relationships and Related Person Transactions—Stockholders Agreement” and will beneficially own approximately 98.5% of the combined voting power of all classes of our stock entitled to vote generally in the election of directors (or 98.2% if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full). As a result, we will be a “controlled company” within the meaning of the corporate governance standards of Nasdaq. Under these rules, a company of which more than 50% of the voting power in the election of directors is held by an individual, group or another company is a “controlled company” and may elect not to comply with certain corporate governance requirements. For example, controlled companies, within one year of the date of the listing of their Class A common stock:

 

   

are not required to have a board that is composed of a majority of “independent directors,” as defined under the rules of such exchange;

 

   

are not required to have a compensation committee that is composed entirely of independent directors; and

 

   

are not required to have director nominations be made, or recommended to the full Board of Directors, by our independent directors or by a nominations committee that is composed entirely of independent directors.

For at least some period following this offering, we intend to utilize certain of these exemptions.

Accordingly, you will not have the same protections afforded to stockholders of companies that are subject to all of the corporate governance requirements of Nasdaq.

We are an “emerging growth company,” and we cannot be certain if the reduced reporting 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. We will remain an “emerging growth company” until the earliest to occur of:

 

   

the last day of the fiscal year during which our total annual revenue equals or exceeds $1.07 billion (subject to adjustment for inflation);

 

   

the last day of the fiscal year following the fifth anniversary of this offering;

 

   

the date on which we have, during the previous three-year period, issued more than $1 billion in non-convertible debt; or

 

   

the date on which we are deemed to be a “large accelerated filer” under the Exchange Act.

We may take advantage of exemptions from various reporting requirements that are applicable to other public companies that are not emerging growth companies, including but not limited to, 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. Investors may find our Class A common stock less attractive because we may 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 per share trading price may be materially adversely affected and more volatile.

 

66


Table of Contents

We will incur increased costs and become subject to additional regulations and requirements as a result of becoming a public company, which could lower our profits, make it more difficult to run our business or divert management’s attention from our business.

As a public company, we will be required to commit significant resources and management time and attention to the requirements of being a public company, which will cause us to incur significant legal, accounting and other expenses that we have not incurred as a private company, including costs associated with public company reporting requirements. We also will incur costs associated with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (the “Sarbanes-Oxley Act”) and related rules implemented by the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) and Nasdaq, and compliance with these requirements will place significant demands on our legal, accounting and finance staff and on our accounting, financial and information systems. In addition, we might not be successful in implementing these requirements. The expenses incurred by public companies generally for reporting and corporate governance purposes have been increasing. We expect these rules and regulations to increase our legal and financial compliance costs and to make some activities more time consuming and costly, although we are currently unable to estimate these costs with any degree of certainty. These laws and regulations also could make it more difficult or costly for us to obtain certain types of insurance, including director and officer liability insurance, and we may be forced to accept reduced policy limits and coverage or incur substantially higher costs to obtain the same or similar coverage. These laws and regulations could also make it more difficult for us to attract and retain qualified persons to serve on our board of directors, our board committees or as our executive officers. Furthermore, if we are unable to satisfy our obligations as a public company, we could be subject to delisting of our Class A common stock, fines, sanctions and other regulatory action and potentially civil litigation.

Our internal controls over financial reporting currently do not meet all of the standards contemplated by Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and failure to achieve and maintain effective internal controls over financial reporting in accordance with Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act could have a material adverse effect on our business and the market price of our Class A common stock.

As a public company, we will have significant requirements for enhanced financial reporting and internal controls. The process of designing and implementing effective internal controls is a continuous effort that will require us to anticipate and react to changes in our business and the economic and regulatory environments and to expend significant resources to maintain a system of internal controls that is adequate to satisfy our reporting obligations as a public company. If we are unable to establish or maintain appropriate internal financial reporting controls and procedures, it could cause us to fail to meet our reporting obligations on a timely basis, result in material misstatements in our consolidated financial statements and harm our operating results. We are currently in the process of updating our control processes and automating certain of our procedures and systems in anticipation of becoming a public company, but our internal controls over financial reporting currently do not meet all of the standards contemplated by Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act that eventually we will be required to meet. Because currently we do not have comprehensive documentation of our internal controls and have not yet tested our internal controls in accordance with Section 404, we cannot conclude in accordance with Section 404 that we do not have a material weakness in our internal controls or a combination of significant deficiencies that could result in the conclusion that we have a material weakness in our internal controls. Our management will first be required to perform an annual assessment of the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting in connection with our second Annual Report on Form 10-K. Our independent public registered accounting firm will first be required to attest to the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting for our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the first year we are no longer an “emerging growth company,” and thereafter on an annual basis. If we are not able to complete our initial assessment of our internal controls and otherwise implement the requirements of Section 404 in a timely manner or with adequate compliance, our independent registered public accounting firm may not be able to certify as to the adequacy of our internal controls over financial reporting.

Matters impacting our internal controls may cause us to be unable to report our financial information on a timely basis and thereby subject us to adverse regulatory consequences, including sanctions by the SEC or

 

67


Table of Contents

violations of applicable stock exchange listing rules, which may result in a breach of the covenants under existing or future financing arrangements. There also could be a negative reaction in the financial markets due to a loss of investor confidence in us and the reliability of our financial statements. Confidence in the reliability of our financial statements also could suffer if we or our independent registered public accounting firm were to report a material weakness in our internal controls over financial reporting. In addition, we may be required to incur costs in improving our internal control system and the hiring of additional personnel. Any such action could materially adversely affect us and lead to a decline in the market price of our Class A common stock.

If securities or industry analysts do not publish research or reports about our business, or if they downgrade their recommendations regarding our Class A common stock, our stock price and trading volume could decline.

The trading market for our Class A common stock will be influenced by the research and reports that industry or securities analysts publish about us or our business. If any of the analysts who cover us downgrade our Class A common stock or publish inaccurate or unfavorable research about our business, our Class A common stock price may decline. If analysts cease coverage of us or fail to regularly publish reports on us, we could lose visibility in the financial markets, which in turn could cause our Class A common stock price or trading volume to decline and our Class A common stock to be less liquid.

If our operating and financial performance in any given period does not meet any guidance that we provide to the public, the market price of our Class A common stock may decline.

We may, but are not obligated to, provide public guidance on our expected operating and financial results for future periods. Any such guidance will be comprised of forward-looking statements subject to the risks and uncertainties described in this prospectus and in our other public filings and public statements. Our actual results may not always be in line with or exceed any guidance we have provided, especially in times of economic uncertainty. If, in the future, our operating or financial results for a particular period do not meet any guidance we provide or the expectations of investment analysts, or if we reduce our guidance for future periods, the market price of our Class A common stock may decline. Even if we do issue public guidance, there can be no assurance that we will continue to do so in the future.

There has been no prior market for our Class A common stock and an active trading market for our Class A common stock may never develop or be sustained, which may cause shares of our Class A common stock to trade at a discount from their initial offering price and make it difficult to sell the shares of Class A common stock you purchase.

Prior to this offering, there has not been a public trading market for shares of our Class A common stock. The initial public offering price per share of Class A common stock will be determined by agreement among us, the selling stockholders and the representatives of the underwriters, and may not be indicative of the price at which shares of our Class A common stock will trade in the public market after this offering. If you purchase shares of our Class A common stock, you may not be able to resell those shares at or above the initial public offering price. We cannot predict the extent to which investor interest in our company will lead to the development of an active trading market on Nasdaq or how liquid that market might become. An active public market for our Class A common stock may not develop or be sustained after the offering. If an active public market does not develop or is not sustained, it may be difficult for you to sell your shares of Class A common stock at a price that is attractive to you, or at all. The market price of our Class A common stock may decline below the initial public offering price.

The market price of shares of our Class A common stock may be volatile or may decline regardless of our operating performance, which could cause the value of your investment to decline.

Even if a trading market develops, the market price of our Class A common stock may be highly volatile and could be subject to wide fluctuations. Securities markets worldwide experience significant price and volume

 

68


Table of Contents

fluctuations. This market volatility, as well as general economic, market or political conditions, could reduce the market price of shares of our Class A common stock regardless of our operating performance. In addition, our operating results may fail to match our past performance and could be below the expectations of public market analysts and investors due to a number of potential factors, including variations in our quarterly operating results, any decision by significant clients to terminate or reduce our services (including failure to renew their contracts with us), additions or departures of key management personnel, failure to meet analysts’ earnings estimates, publication of research reports about our industry, the performance of direct and indirect competitors, litigation and government investigations, changes or proposed changes in laws or regulations or differing interpretations or enforcement thereof affecting our business, adverse market reaction to any indebtedness we may incur or securities we may issue in the future, changes in market valuations of similar companies or speculation in the press or investment community, announcements by our competitors of significant contracts, acquisitions, dispositions, strategic partnerships, joint ventures or capital commitments, adverse publicity about the industries we participate in or individual scandals, and in response the market price of shares of our Class A common stock could decrease significantly. You may be unable to resell your shares of Class A common stock at or above the initial public offering price.

Stock markets have recently experienced extreme price and volume fluctuations. In the past, following periods of volatility in the overall market and the market price of a company’s securities, securities class action litigation has often been instituted against these companies. This litigation, if instituted against us, could result in substantial costs and a diversion of our management’s attention and resources.

Because we have no current plans to pay cash dividends on our common stock following this offering, you may not receive any return on your investment unless you sell your Class A common stock for a price greater than that which you paid for it.

We have no current plans to pay cash dividends following this offering. The declaration, amount and payment of any future dividends on shares of common stock will be at the sole discretion of our board of directors. Our board of directors may take into account general and economic conditions, our financial condition and results of operations, our available cash and current and anticipated cash needs, capital requirements, contractual, legal, tax and regulatory restrictions and implications on the payment of dividends by us to our stockholders or by our subsidiaries to us and such other factors as our board of directors may deem relevant. In addition, our ability to pay dividends is limited by our existing indebtedness and may be limited by covenants of other indebtedness we or our subsidiaries incur in the future. As a result, you may not receive any return on an investment in our Class A common stock unless you sell your shares of our Class A common stock for a price greater than that which you paid for them.

We have broad discretion to determine how to use the funds raised in this offering, and may use them in ways that may not enhance our operating results or the price of our Class A common stock about our business.

Our management will have broad discretion over the use of the net proceeds to us from this offering, and we could spend the proceeds from this offering in ways our stockholders may not agree with or that do not yield a favorable return, if at all. We intend to use the net proceeds received by us from this offering, together with cash on hand, to satisfy payments of approximately $127.4 million in respect of vested phantom shares, including $23.5 million in respect of vested phantom shares held by certain of our executive officers, that will become due upon the completion of this offering, based on the assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, including $10.0 million in deferred dividend payments in respect of such vested phantom shares. We intend to use the remainder of the net proceeds, if any, from this offering for general corporate purposes, which may include but are not limited to future acquisitions. However, our use of these proceeds may differ substantially from our current plans. If we do not invest or apply the proceeds of this offering in ways that improve our operating results, we may fail to achieve expected financial results, which could cause our stock price to decline.

 

69


Table of Contents

Investors in this offering will suffer immediate and substantial dilution.

The initial public offering price per share of Class A common stock will be substantially higher than our net tangible deficit per share of Class A and Class B common stock immediately after this offering. As a result, you will pay a price per share of Class A common stock that substantially exceeds the per share book value of our tangible assets after subtracting our liabilities. In addition, you will pay more for your shares of Class A common stock than the amounts paid by our pre-IPO owners. Assuming an offering price of $23.00 per share of Class A common stock, which is the midpoint of the range on the front cover of this prospectus, you will incur immediate and substantial dilution in an amount of $24.41 per share of Class A common stock (after giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward stock split). See “Dilution.”

You may be diluted by the future issuance of additional Class A common stock or Class B common stock in connection with our incentive plans, acquisitions or otherwise.

After this offering we will have approximately 2,486,800,000 shares of Class A common stock and approximately 165,909,826 shares of Class B common stock authorized but unissued (after giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward stock split). Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will authorize us to issue these shares of Class A and Class B common stock and options, rights, warrants and appreciation rights relating to Class A and Class B common stock for the consideration and on the terms and conditions established by our board of directors in its sole discretion, whether in connection with acquisitions or otherwise. As of May 31, 2021, we had 7,597,730 shares of Class A common stock issuable in respect of outstanding stock options granted under the 2019 Stock Incentive Plan with a weighted average exercise price of $5.17 per share (after giving effect to the 2021 Dividend and the 10-for-1 forward stock split), which are not currently exercisable and will generally begin vesting upon the first anniversary of this offering. Additionally, we have reserved 18,775,051 shares of Class A common stock for issuance under our Omnibus Incentive Plan. See “Executive and Director Compensation—Omnibus Incentive Plan.” Any Class A or Class B common stock that we issue, including under our Omnibus Incentive Plan or other equity incentive plans that we may adopt in the future, would dilute the percentage ownership held by the investors who purchase Class A common stock in this offering.

We may issue preferred stock whose terms could materially adversely affect the voting power or value of our Class A common stock.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will authorize us to issue, without the approval of our stockholders, 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 the Class A common stock.

If we or our pre-IPO owners sell additional shares of our Class A common stock or Class B common stock after this offering or are perceived by the public markets as intending to sell them, the market price of our Class A common stock could decline.

The sale of substantial amounts of shares of our Class A common stock or Class B common stock in the public or private markets, or the perception that such sales could occur, could harm the prevailing market price of shares of our Class A common stock. These sales, or the possibility that these sales may occur, also might make it more difficult for you to sell your Class A common stock in the future at a time and at a price that you deem appropriate, if at all. Upon completion of this offering, after giving effect to (i) the Class B Reclassification, and the subsequent conversion of 7,646,846 shares of Class B common stock into an equivalent number of shares of Class A common stock in connection with the sale of such shares by the selling stockholders in this offering, and (ii) the effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, we will have a total of 13,200,000 shares of our Class A common stock outstanding (or 15,180,000 shares of our Class A common stock

 

70


Table of Contents

outstanding if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares of our Class A common stock in full) and a total of 84,090,174 shares of our Class B common stock outstanding (or 82,110,174 shares of our Class B common stock outstanding if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares of our Class A common stock in full). All of the outstanding shares of our Class A common stock will be sold in this offering and will be freely tradable without restriction or further registration under the Securities Act, except that any shares held by our affiliates, as that term is defined under Rule 144 of the Securities Act, may be sold only in compliance with the limitations described in “Shares Eligible for Future Sale.”

The outstanding 84,090,174 shares of Class B common stock held by our pre-IPO owners and management after this offering (or 82,110,174 shares if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full) will be subject to certain restrictions on resale. We, our officers, directors and certain holders (including the selling stockholders) of our outstanding shares of Class B common stock immediately prior to this offering, including our Sponsor, that collectively will own 84,090,174 shares of Class B common stock (or 82,110,174 shares if the underwriters exercise their option to purchase additional shares in full) following this offering, will sign lock-up agreements with the underwriters that will, subject to certain customary exceptions, restrict the sale of the shares of our Class A or Class B common stock held by them for 180 days following the date of this prospectus. Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC and J.P. Morgan Securities LLC may, in their sole discretion, release all or any portion of the shares of Class A or Class B common stock subject to lock-up agreements. See “Underwriting (Conflicts of Interest)” for a description of these lock-up agreements. See “Principal and Selling Stockholders” and “Shares Eligible for Future Sale—Lock-Up Agreements.”

Upon the expiration of the lock-up agreements described above, all of such shares will be eligible for resale in the public market, subject, in the case of shares held by our affiliates, to volume, manner of sale and other limitations under Rule 144. We expect that our Sponsor will continue to be considered an affiliate following the expiration of the lock-up period based on its expected share ownership and its board nomination rights. Certain other of our stockholders may also be considered affiliates at that time. However, subject to the expiration or waiver of the 180-day lock-up period, the holders of these shares of common stock will have the right, subject to certain exceptions and conditions, to require us to register their shares of common stock under the Securities Act, and they will have the right to participate in future registrations of securities by us. Registration of any of these outstanding shares of common stock would result in such shares becoming freely tradable without compliance with Rule 144 upon effectiveness of the registration statement. Future transfers by holders of our Class B common stock will generally result in those shares converting into shares of our Class A common stock, subject to limited exceptions. See “Shares Eligible for Future Sale.”

We intend to file one or more registration statements on Form S-8 under the Securities Act to register shares of our Class A common stock or securities convertible into or exchangeable for shares of our Class A common stock issued pursuant to our 2019 Stock Incentive Plan and our Omnibus Incentive Plan. Any such Form S-8 registration statements will automatically become effective upon filing. Accordingly, shares registered under such registration statements will be available for sale in the open market. We expect that the initial registration statement on Form S-8 will cover 26,372,781 shares of our Class A common stock.

In the future, we may also issue our securities in connection with investments or acquisitions. The amount of shares of our Class A common stock issued in connection with an investment or acquisition could constitute a material portion of our then outstanding shares of Class A common stock. As restrictions on resale end, the market price of our shares of Class A common stock could drop significantly if the holders of these restricted shares sell them or are perceived by the market as intending to sell them. These factors could also make it more difficult for us to raise additional funds through future offerings of our shares of Class A common stock or other securities or to use our shares of Class A common stock as consideration for acquisitions of other businesses, investments or other corporate purposes.

 

71


Table of Contents

Anti-takeover provisions in our organizational documents and Delaware law might discourage or delay acquisition attempts for us that you might consider favorable.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and amended and restated bylaws that will become effective immediately prior to the consummation of this offering will contain provisions that may make the merger or acquisition of our company more difficult without the approval of our board of directors. Among other things, these provisions:

 

   

provide that our board of directors will be divided into three classes, as nearly equal in size as possible, with directors in each class serving three-year terms and with terms of the directors of only one class expiring in any given year;

 

   

provide for the removal of directors only for cause and only upon the affirmative vote of the holders of at least 66 2/3% in voting power of the outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote, if the parties to our stockholders agreement and their affiliates cease to beneficially own less than 30% of the total voting power of all then outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote generally in the election of directors and provide that specified directors designated pursuant to the stockholders agreement may not be removed without cause without the consent of the specified designating party;

 

   

our dual class common stock structure, which provides our holders of Class B common stock with the ability to significantly influence the outcome of matters requiring stockholder approval, even if they own significantly less than a majority of the shares of our outstanding Class A common stock and Class B common stock;

 

   

provide that, subject to the rights of the holders of any preferred stock and the rights granted pursuant to the stockholders agreement, vacancies and newly created directorships may be filled only by the remaining directors, if the parties to our stockholders agreement and their affiliates cease to beneficially own less than 30% of the total voting power of all then outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote generally in the election of directors;

 

   

would allow us to authorize the issuance of shares of one or more series of preferred stock, including in connection with a stockholder rights plan, financing transactions or otherwise, the terms of which series may be established and the shares of which may be issued without stockholder approval, and which may include super voting, special approval, dividend, or other rights or preferences superior to the rights of the holders of common stock;

 

   

prohibit stockholder action by written consent from and after the date on which the parties to our stockholders agreement and their affiliates cease to beneficially own at least 30% of the total voting power of all then outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote generally in the election of directors and require the consent of our Sponsor in any action by written consent;

 

   

provide for certain limitations on convening special stockholder meetings;

 

   

provide that the board of directors is expressly authorized to make, alter, or repeal our bylaws and that our stockholders may only amend our bylaws with the approval of 66 2/3% or more of all of the outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote, if the parties to our stockholders agreement and their affiliates beneficially own less than 30% of the total voting power of all then outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote generally in the election of directors; and

 

   

provide that certain provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation may be amended only by the affirmative vote of the holders of at least 66 2/3% in voting power of the outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote thereon, if the parties to our stockholders agreement and their affiliates cease to beneficially own less than 30% of the total voting power of all then outstanding shares of our capital stock entitled to vote generally in the election of directors;

 

   

establish advance notice requirements for nominations for elections to our board or for proposing matters that can be acted upon by stockholders at stockholder meetings; and

 

   

provide that, subject to the rights of holders of any preferred stock and the terms of our stockholders agreement, the total number of directors shall be determined exclusively by resolution adopted by the board.

 

72


Table of Contents

We have opted out of Section 203 of the General Corporation Law of the State of Delaware (the “DGCL”); however, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation contains similar provisions providing that we may not engage in certain “business combinations” with any “interested stockholder” for a three-year period following the time that the stockholder became an interested stockholder, unless the transaction fits within an enumerated exception, such as board approval of the business combination or the transaction that resulted in such stockholder becoming an interested stockholder. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that our Sponsor and its affiliates, and any of their respective direct or indirect transferees, and any group as to which such persons are a party, do not constitute “interested stockholders” for purposes of this provision. See “Description of Capital Stock—Business Combinations.” These anti-takeover provisions and other provisions under our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, amended and restated by laws or Delaware law could discourage, delay or prevent a transaction involving a change in control of our company, including actions that our stockholders may deem advantageous, or negatively affect the trading price of our Class A common stock. These provisions could also discourage proxy contests and make it more difficult for you and other stockholders to elect directors of your choosing and to cause us to take other corporate actions you desire.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will designate the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware and the federal district courts of the United States of America as the sole and exclusive forums for certain types of actions and proceedings that may be initiated by our stockholders, which could limit our stockholders’ ability to obtain a favorable judicial forum for disputes with the Company or the Company’s directors, officers or other employees.

Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that, unless we consent to the selection of an alternative forum, the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware shall, to the fullest extent permitted by law, be the sole and exclusive forum for any (1) derivative action or proceeding brought on behalf of our Company, (2) action asserting a claim of breach of a fiduciary duty owed by any current or former director, officer, employee or stockholder of our Company to the Company or the Company’s stockholders, (3) action asserting a claim against the Company or any current or former director or officer of the Company arising pursuant to any provision of the DGCL or our amended and restated certificate of incorporation or our amended and restated bylaws, or (4) action asserting a claim against us or any current or former director or officer of the Company governed by the internal affairs doctrine. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will further provide that, unless we consent in writing to the selection of an alternative forum, to the fullest extent permitted by law, the federal district courts of the United States of America will be the exclusive forum for the resolution of any complaint asserting a cause of action arising under the federal securities laws of the United States of America. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation will provide that, to the fullest extent permitted by law, any person or entity purchasing or otherwise acquiring any interest in any shares of our capital stock shall be deemed to have notice of and to have provided consent to the forum provisions in our amended and restated certificate of incorporation. These choice-of-forum provisions may limit a stockholder’s ability to bring a claim in a judicial forum that it finds favorable or convenient for disputes with the Company or the Company’s directors, officers, other employees or stockholders, which may discourage such lawsuits. However, we note that there is uncertainty as to whether a court would enforce our forum selection provisions and that investors cannot waive compliance with the federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder. If a court were to find these provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation inapplicable or unenforceable with respect to one or more of the specified types of actions or proceedings, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving such matters in other jurisdictions, which could materially and adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations and result in a diversion of the time and resources of our management and board of directors.

 

73


Table of Contents

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This prospectus contains forward-looking statements that reflect our current views with respect to, among other things, our operations, our financial performance and our industry. Forward-looking statements include all statements that are not historical facts. In some cases, you can identify these forward-looking statements by the use of words such as “outlook,” “believe,” “expect,” “potential,” “continue,” “may,” “will,” “should,” “could,” “seek,” “predict,” “intend,” “trend,” “plan,” “estimate,” “anticipate” or the negative version of these words or other comparable words. Such forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, there are or will be important factors that could cause actual outcomes or results to differ materially from those indicated in these statements. These factors include but are not limited to those described under “Risk Factors.”

These factors should not be construed as exhaustive and should be read in conjunction with the other cautionary statements that are included in this prospectus. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should any of our assumptions prove incorrect, our actual results may vary in material respects from those projected in these forward-looking statements. Factors or events that could cause our actual results to differ may emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for us to predict all of them. Our forward-looking statements do not reflect the potential impact of any future acquisitions, mergers, dispositions, joint ventures, investments, or other strategic transactions we may make. You should not place undue reliance on our forward-looking statements.

Any forward-looking statement made by us in this prospectus speaks only as of the date of this prospectus. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or review any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future developments or otherwise, except as required by law.

 

74


Table of Contents

MARKET AND INDUSTRY DATA

This prospectus includes market and industry data and forecasts that we have derived from independent consultant reports, publicly available information, various industry publications, other published industry sources and our internal data and estimates. Independent consultant reports, industry publications and other published industry sources generally indicate that the information contained therein was obtained from sources believed to be reliable.

The source of certain statistical data, estimates and forecasts contained in this prospectus include, among others, the following independent industry publications or reports:

 

   

IDC, Worldwide and U.S. Finance and Accounting and Procurement Business Process Outsourcing Services Forecast, 2020-2024, May 2020;

 

   

Everest Group, Customer Experience Management (CXM) Annual Report 2019: Delivering Next-Generation Contact Center Services, September 2019;

 

   

Domo, Data Never Sleeps 8.0 – How much data is generated every minute?, 2020;

 

   

JC Market Research, Global Content Moderation Solutions Market, 2020 COVID-19 Impact Assessment, 2020;

 

   

IDC, Worldwide Artificial Intelligence Services Forecast, 4 year CAGR from 2020-2024, August 2020;

 

   

United States Bureau of Economic Analysis, New Digital Economy Estimates, August 2020;

 

   

The Business Research Company, Social Media Global Market Briefing 2020: COVID 19 Impact and Recovery, April 13, 2020;

 

   

TechSci Research, 2015-2025 Global Fintech Market Forecast and Opportunities, May 2020;

 

   

Technavio, Global Digital Health Market 2020-2024;

 

   

Allied Market Research, Video Streaming Market – Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2020-2027, a report empowered by EMIS www.emis.com, December 2019;

 

   

Technavio, Global Mobile Gaming Market 2020-2024;

 

   

eMarketer, Global Ecommerce Update 2021 – Worldwide Ecommerce Will Approach $5 Trillion This Year, January 2021;

 

   

Technavio, Global Ride Hailing Services Market 2020-2024;

 

   

Technavio, Global Food Delivery Services Market 2020-2024;

 

   

PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, PwC Future of Customer Experience Survey 2017/18;

 

   

Technavio, Global Customer Analytics Applications Market 2020-2024;

 

   

Korn Ferry Institute, The Talent Forecast – Part 1: Adapting today’s candidate priorities for tomorrow’s organizational success, 2017;

 

   

QuestionPro Workforce, Culture Benchmarks, January 2019;

 

   

ClearlyRated, 2020 NPS Benchmarks for IT Service Providers, April 2019; and

 

   

Glassdoor, 50 HR and Recruiting Stats for 2019.

The Everest Global, Inc. (“Everest Group”) report and its content described and cited herein (the “Everest Group Report”) represents research opinions or viewpoints, not representations or statements of fact. The Everest Group Report was published as part of a membership service provided by Everest Group. Unless otherwise

 

75


Table of Contents

specifically stated in the Everest Group Report, the Everest Group Report has not been updated or revised since the original publication date of the Everest Group Report. The opinions expressed in the Everest Group Report are subject to change without notice. Everest Group disclaims all representations and warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this Everest Group Report, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy or completeness of information. Nothing in the Everest Group Report is considered part of this prospectus. Information used in preparing the Everest Group Report may have been obtained from or through the public, the companies in the Everest Group Report, or third-party sources. Everest Group assumes no responsibility for independent verification of such information and has relied on such to be complete and accurate in all respects. To the extent such information includes estimates or forecasts, Everest Group has assumed that such estimates and forecasts have been properly prepared. The Everest Group Report is not intended to be, and must not be, taken as the basis for an investment decision and it may not be used or relied upon in evaluating the merits of any investment, or in taking or not taking any action. The Everest Group Report will not be construed as investment, legal, tax or other advice.

Although we believe that these third-party sources are reliable, we do not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of this information, and neither we nor the underwriters have independently verified this information. Some market data and statistical information are also based on our good faith estimates, which are derived from management’s knowledge of our industry and such independent sources referred to above. Certain market, ranking and industry data included elsewhere in this prospectus, including the size of certain markets and our size or position and the positions of our competitors within these markets, including our services relative to our competitors, are based on estimates of our management. These estimates have been derived from our management’s knowledge and experience in the markets in which we operate, as well as information obtained from surveys, reports by market research firms, our clients, suppliers, trade and business organizations and other contacts in the markets in which we operate and have not been verified by independent sources. Unless otherwise noted, all of our market share and market position information presented in this prospectus is an approximation. Our market share and market position in each of our lines of business, unless otherwise noted, is based on our sales relative to the estimated sales in the markets we served. References herein to our being a leader in a market or product category refer to our belief that we have a leading market share position in each specified market, unless the context otherwise requires. As there are no publicly available sources supporting this belief, it is based solely on our internal analysis of our sales as compared to our estimates of sales of our competitors. In addition, the discussion herein regarding our various end markets is based on how we define the end markets for our products, which products may be either part of larger overall end markets or end markets that include other types of products and services.

Our internal data and estimates are based upon information obtained from trade and business organizations and other contacts in the markets in which we operate and our management’s understanding of industry conditions. Although we believe that such information is reliable, we have not had this information verified by any independent sources.

TRADEMARKS, SERVICE MARKS AND TRADE NAMES

We own or have rights to trademarks, service marks or trade names that we use in connection with the operation of our business. In addition, our names, logos and website domain names and addresses are our service marks or trademarks. We do not intend our use or display of other companies’ trademarks, service marks, copyrights or trade names to imply a relationship with, or endorsement or sponsorship of us by, any other companies. The trademarks we own or have the right to use include, among others, TaskUs. We also own or have the rights to copyrights that protect the content of our literature, be it in print or electronic form.

Solely for convenience, the trademarks, service marks and trade names referred to in this prospectus are used without the ® and symbols, but such references are not intended to indicate, in any way, that we will not assert, to the fullest extent under applicable law, our rights or the rights of the applicable licensors to these trademarks, service marks and trade names. All trademarks, service marks and trade names appearing in this prospectus are the property of their respective owners.

 

76


Table of Contents

USE OF PROCEEDS

We estimate that the net proceeds to TaskUs, Inc. from this offering at an assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions and before estimated offering expenses, will be approximately $120.7 million. A $1.00 increase or decrease in the assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share would increase or decrease, as applicable, the net proceeds to TaskUs, Inc. from this offering by approximately $5.2 million, assuming the number of shares offered by us remains the same as set forth on the cover page of this prospectus and after deducting the estimated underwriting discounts and commissions.

We intend to use the net proceeds received by us from this offering, together with cash on hand, to satisfy payments of approximately $127.4 million in respect of vested phantom shares, including $23.5 million in respect of vested phantom shares held by certain of our executive officers, that will become due upon the completion of this offering, based on the assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, including $10.0 million in deferred dividend payments in respect of such vested phantom shares. We intend to use the remainder of the net proceeds, if any, from this offering for general corporate purposes, which may include but are not limited to future acquisitions.

Pending specific application of these proceeds, we expect to invest them primarily in short-term demand deposits at various financial institutions.

We will not receive any proceeds from the sale of shares of Class A common stock offered by the selling stockholders (including any sales pursuant to the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares from the selling stockholders).

 

77


Table of Contents

DIVIDEND POLICY

We have no current plans to pay dividends on our common stock following this offering. Any decision to declare and pay dividends in the future will be made at the sole discretion of our board of directors and will depend on, among other things, our results of operations, cash requirements, financial condition, contractual restrictions and other factors that our board of directors may deem relevant. Because we are a holding company and have no direct operations, we will only be able to pay dividends from funds we receive from our subsidiaries. In addition, our ability to pay dividends is limited by covenants in our existing indebtedness and may be limited by the agreements governing any indebtedness we or our subsidiaries may incur in the future.

 

78


Table of Contents

CAPITALIZATION

The following table sets forth our cash and cash equivalents and capitalization as of March 31, 2021:

 

   

on a historical basis;

 

   

on a pro forma basis, giving effect to (i) the Class B Reclassification, (ii) the effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation (including the ten-for-one forward stock split of our common stock that will be effected thereby) and (iii) the payment of the 2021 Dividend, as if such reclassification, effectiveness and payment had occurred on March 31, 2021.

 

   

on a pro forma as adjusted basis, giving effect to:

 

   

the pro forma adjustments set forth above;

 

   

the sale by us of 5,553,154 shares of Class A common stock in this offering at an assumed public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus;

 

   

the conversion of 7,646,846 shares of Class B common stock into an equivalent number of shares of Class A common stock in connection with the sale of shares by the selling stockholders in this offering; and

 

   

the application of the net proceeds received by us from this offering as described under “Use of Proceeds” as if this offering and the application of the net proceeds of this offering had occurred on March 31, 2021 at the assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which includes the anticipated payment of $127.4 million cash settlement in respect of the vested phantom shares that will become due upon the completion of this offering.

The information below is illustrative only and our capitalization following this offering will be adjusted based on the actual initial public offering price and other terms of this offering determined at pricing. Cash and cash equivalents are not components of our total capitalization. You should read this table together with the other information contained in this prospectus, including “Use of Proceeds,” “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and the historical financial statements and related notes thereto included elsewhere in this prospectus.

 

(In thousands, except share and per share amounts)    Actual     Pro
Forma
    Pro Forma
As Adjusted(1)
 

Cash and cash equivalents

   $ 135,493     $ 85,493     $ 78,746  
  

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Current portion of debt(2)

   $ 47,296     $ 47,296     $ 47,296  

Long-term debt

     196,257       196,257       196,257  

Existing common stock, par value $0.01 per share, 10,000,000 shares authorized, 9,173,702 shares issued and outstanding, actual; no shares authorized, issued and outstanding, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted

     92       —         —    

Class A common stock, par value $0.01 per share, no shares authorized, issued and outstanding, actual; 2,500,000,000 shares authorized, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted; no shares issued and outstanding, pro forma; and 13,200,000 shares issued and outstanding, pro forma as adjusted

     —         —         132  

Class B common stock, par value $0.01 per share, no shares authorized, issued and outstanding, actual; 250,000,000 shares authorized, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted; 91,737,020 shares issued and outstanding, pro forma; and 84,090,174 shares issued and outstanding, pro forma as adjusted

     —         92       15  

Preferred stock, par value $0.01 per share, no shares authorized, issued and outstanding, actual; 250,000,000 shares authorized and no shares issued and outstanding, pro forma and pro forma as adjusted

     —         —         —    

Additional paid-in capital(3)

     399,027       349,027       469,670  

Accumulated deficit(4)

     (50,891     (50,891     (178,336

Accumulated other comprehensive income

     2,561       2,561       2,561  
  

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Total shareholders’ equity

     350,789       300,789       294,042  

Total capitalization

   $ 594,342     $ 544,342     $ 537,595  
  

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

79


Table of Contents

 

(1)

Each $1.00 increase or decrease in the assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share would increase or decrease, as applicable, cash and cash equivalents, additional paid-in capital and total shareholders’ equity by $5.2 million, assuming the number of shares of Class A common stock offered by us remains the same as set forth on the cover page of this prospectus and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions. Additionally, payment of transaction costs relating to this offering have not been reflected in the pro forma as adjusted amounts.

(2)

As of March 31, 2021, $39.9 million was drawn under the Revolving Credit Facility. For a further description and definition of the Revolving Credit Facility, see “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness.”

(3)

Additional paid-in capital was decreased by $50.0 million, on a pro forma basis, to reflect the $50.0 million dividend payment to our existing shareholders paid on April 16, 2021.

(4)

Accumulated deficit was increased by $127.4 million, on a pro forma adjusted basis, to reflect the settlement in respect of the vested phantom shares that will become due upon the completion of this offering.

 

80


Table of Contents

DILUTION

Information in this Dilution section reflects a 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock to occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part and prior to the closing of this offering.

If you invest in shares of our Class A common stock in this offering, your investment will be immediately diluted to the extent of the difference between the initial public offering price per share of Class A common stock and the pro forma as adjusted net tangible deficit per share of common stock after this offering. Dilution results from the fact that the per share offering price of the shares of Class A common stock is substantially in excess of the pro forma as adjusted net tangible deficit per share attributable to the shares of common stock held by our pre-IPO owners.

Our pro forma net tangible deficit as of March 31, 2021 was $130.5 million, or $1.42 per share of common stock. Pro forma net tangible deficit represents the amount of total tangible assets less total liabilities, and pro forma net tangible deficit per share of common stock represents net tangible deficit divided by the number of shares of Class A and Class B common stock outstanding, after giving effect to (i) the Class B Reclassification, and the subsequent conversion of 7,646,846 shares of Class B common stock into an equivalent number of shares of Class A common stock in connection with the sale of such shares by the selling stockholders in this offering, (ii) the effectiveness of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and (iii) the payment of the 2021 Dividend.

After giving further effect to this offering and the application of the proceeds therefrom as described in “Use of Proceeds,” based on the assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, our pro forma net tangible deficit as of March 31, 2021 would have been $137.3 million, or $1.41 per share of Class A common stock. This represents an increase in pro forma net tangible book value of $0.01 per share of common stock to our pre-IPO owners and an immediate dilution in pro forma net tangible deficit of $24.41 per share of common stock to investors in this offering.

The following table illustrates this dilution on a per share of common stock basis assuming the underwriters do not exercise their option to purchase additional shares of Class A common stock:

 

Assumed initial public offering price per share of Class A common stock

     $ 23.00  

Pro forma net tangible deficit per share of common stock as of March 31, 2021

   $ (1.42  

Increase in pro forma net tangible book value per share of common stock attributable to investors in this offering

   $ 0.01    
  

 

 

   

Pro forma as adjusted net tangible deficit per share of common stock after the offering

     $ (1.41
    

 

 

 

Dilution per share of Class A common stock to investors in this offering

     $ 24.41  
    

 

 

 

The following table summarizes, as of March 31, 2021, the total number of shares of common stock purchased, the total cash consideration paid, and the average price per share paid, in each case by pre-IPO owners and by investors in this offering. As the table shows, new investors purchasing shares in this offering will pay an average price per share substantially higher than our pre-IPO owners paid. The table below reflects an assumed initial public offering price of $23.00 per share, which is the midpoint of the price range set forth on the cover page of this prospectus, for shares purchased in this offering and excludes underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by us:

 

     Shares of Common Stock
Purchased
    Total
Consideration
    Average
Price Per

Share of
Common Stock
 
(In thousands, except per share amounts)    Number      Percent     Amount      Percent  

Pre-IPO owners

     84,090        86.4   $ 298,887        49.6   $ 3.55  
            

Investors in this offering

     13,200        13.6   $ 303,600        50.4   $ 23.00  
  

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

 

    

 

 

   

Total

     97,290        100.0   $ 602,487        100.0   $ 6.19  
  

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

81


Table of Contents

Each $1.00 increase in the assumed offering price of $23.00 per share would increase total consideration paid to us by investors in this offering by $5.2 million, assuming the number of shares offered by us remains the same and after deducting estimated underwriting discounts and commissions. A $1.00 decrease in the assumed initial public offering price per share would result in equal changes in the opposite direction.

The dilution information above is for illustrative purposes only. Our net tangible deficit following the consummation of this offering is subject to adjustment based on the actual initial public offering price of our shares and other terms of this offering determined at pricing.

 

82


Table of Contents

SELECTED HISTORICAL CONSOLIDATED FINANCIAL DATA

The following tables present selected historical consolidated financial information for the periods and as of the dates indicated and should be read in conjunction with the “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” “Summary Historical Consolidated Financial and other Data” and the consolidated financial statements and notes thereto included elsewhere in this prospectus.

The selected historical consolidated financial information presented below for the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019 have been derived from our audited consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The selected historical consolidated financial information presented below for the period from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018 (Successor) and the period from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 (Predecessor) have been derived from our audited consolidated financial statements and related notes not included in this prospectus. The selected historical consolidated financial information presented below for the years ended December 31, 2017, and 2016 have been derived from our unaudited consolidated financial statements that are not included in this prospectus. The period from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018 (Successor) and the period from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 (Predecessor) are distinct reporting periods, and certain financial information for the Successor period is not comparable to the Predecessor period due to a new basis of accounting resulting from the application of acquisition accounting in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition. The selected historical consolidated financial information presented below for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 have been derived from our unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements have been prepared on the same basis as our audited consolidated financial statements and, in the opinion of our management, reflect all normal recurring adjustments necessary for the fair statement of our consolidated results for these periods. The results for any interim period are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for the full year. Our historical results are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for any future period.

 

    Successor           Predecessor              
(in thousands, except
margin amounts)
  Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018 through
December 31,
2018
          January 1,
2018 through
September 30,
2018
    Year ended
December 31,
2017
    Year ended
December 31,
2016
    Three
months
ended
March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended
March 31,
2020
 
                                  (unaudited)     (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Statement of Operations Data:

                   

Service revenue

  $ 478,046     $ 359,681     $ 85,709         $ 168,501     $ 117,288     $ 79,701     $ 152,871     $ 102,429  

Operating income

  $ 50,329     $ 36,862     $ 3,690         $ 26,323     $ 13,867     $ 5,807     $ 22,401     $ 5,494  

Income before taxes

  $ 44,419     $ 29,529     $ 2,508         $ 24,142     $ 14,044     $ 5,733     $ 20,066     $ 1,854  

Net income (loss)

  $ 34,533     $ 33,940     $ (871       $ 33,094     $ 9,022     $ 5,340     $ 16,507     $ 1,515  

Net income (loss) per common share, basic and diluted(1)

  $ 3.76     $ 3.70     $ (0.09       $ 3.02     $ 0.82     $ 0.49     $ 1.80     $ 0.17  

Pro forma net income (loss) per common share, basic and diluted (unaudited)(2)

  $ 0.38     $ 0.37     $ (0.01             $ 0.18     $ 0.02  

 

(1)

Presented on a historical basis without giving effect to 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock to occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement. See pro forma information below for per share information giving effect to the forward stock split.

(2)

The unaudited pro forma net income (loss) per common share, basic and diluted, is based on our historical consolidated statements of income after giving effect to the 10-for-1 forward split of our common stock, which will occur after the effectiveness of the registration statement.

 

83


Table of Contents
    Successor           Predecessor        

(in thousands, except per share amounts)

  December 31,
2020
    December 31,
2019
    December 31,
2018
          December 31,
2017
    December 31,
2016
    March 31,
2021
 
                            (unaudited)     (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Balance Sheet Data:

               

Cash

  $ 107,728     $ 37,541     $ 25,281         $ 19,275     $ 9,120     $ 135,493  

Total assets

  $ 707,506     $ 610,675     $ 585,380         $ 69,031     $ 41,092     $ 731,645  

Current portion of debt

  $ 45,984     $ 2,431     $ 450         $ 9,607     $ 1,389     $ 47,296  

Long-term debt

  $ 198,768     $ 204,874     $ 82,650         $ 1,944     $ 3,611     $ 196,257  

Distributions paid per common share

  $ —       $ 14.72     $ —           $ —       $ —       $ —    

 

     Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    Full Year 2018  

Key Operational Metrics:

      

Headcount (approx. at period end)(1)

     23,600       18,400       13,800  

Net revenue retention rate(2)

     117     139     121

 

(1)

“Headcount” refers to TaskUs employees as of the end of a given measurement period.

(2)

“Net revenue retention rate” is an important metric we calculate annually to measure the retention and growth in the use of our services by our existing clients. Our net revenue retention rate as of a given fiscal year is calculated using a measurement period consisting of the two consecutive fiscal years ending with and including the most recent applicable fiscal year. Next, we define our “base cohort” as the population of clients that were using our services during the entire 12-month period of the first year of the measurement period. Net revenue retention rate is calculated as the quotient obtained by dividing (a) the revenue generated by the base cohort in the second year of measurement by (b) the revenue generated by the base cohort in the first year of measurement. The decline in the net revenue retention rate for the year ended December 31, 2020 as compared to the previous year was primarily driven by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic due to the reduction in volumes for certain clients in the ride sharing and self-driving autonomous vehicle markets who experienced a decline in their end customer volumes, which were significantly impacted by the lockdown restrictions globally. Normalizing for the decline in volume from the ride sharing and self-driving autonomous vehicle markets, net revenue retention rate in 2020 would have been approximately 126%. We expect the uncertainty related to these markets to continue throughout the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, the net revenue retention rate for the year ended December 31, 2019 reflected the rapid growth in revenue attributable to our largest client during the year, as compared to more steady state year over year revenue growth for our largest client for the year ended December 31, 2020, contributing to the remainder of the change in the net revenue retention rate.

 

84


Table of Contents
    Successor           Predecessor              

(in thousands, except
margin amounts)

  Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018  through
December 31,
2018
          January 1,
2018  through
September 30,
2018
    Year ended
December 31,
2017
    Year ended
December 31,
2016
    Three
months
ended
March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended
March 31,
2020
 
                                  (unaudited)     (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Non-GAAP Financial Measures:

                   

Adjusted Net Income(1)

  $ 69,394     $ 52,975     $ 9,797         $ 22,591     $ 8,607     $ 5,281     $ 28,198     $ 10,163  

Net Income (Loss) Margin

    7.2     9.4     (1.0 )%          19.6     7.7     6.7     10.8     1.5
 

Adjusted Net Income Margin(1)

    14.5     14.7     11.4         13.4     7.3     6.6     18.4     9.9
 

EBITDA(2)

  $ 90,903     $ 72,056     $ 12,400         $ 33,236     $ 21,433     $ 10,432     $ 32,562     $ 13,523  

Adjusted EBITDA(2)

  $ 106,887     $ 74,239       18,356         $ 38,594     $ 21,018     $ 10,373     $ 39,541     $ 17,459  

Adjusted EBITDA Margin(2)

    22.4     20.6     21.4         22.9     17.9     13.0     25.9     17.0

 

(1)

Adjusted Net Income is a non-GAAP profitability measure that represents net income or loss for the period before the impact of amortization of intangible assets and certain items that are considered to hinder comparison of the performance of our businesses on a period-over-period basis or with other businesses. During the periods presented, we exclude from Adjusted Net Income offering costs, transaction related costs associated with the Blackstone Acquisition and the tax benefit associated with certain of such costs, the effect of foreign currency gains and losses, losses on disposals of assets, COVID-19 related expenses, severance costs, lease termination costs, natural disaster costs and contingent consideration, which include costs that are required to be expensed in accordance with GAAP, and non-recurring expenses incurred in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic. Our management believes that the inclusion of supplementary adjustments to net income (loss) applied in presenting Adjusted Net Income are appropriate to provide additional information to investors about certain material non-cash items and about unusual items that we do not expect to continue at the same level in the future.

 

85


Table of Contents

The following table reconciles net income (loss), the most directly comparable GAAP measure, to Adjusted Net Income:

 

    Successor           Predecessor              

(in thousands, except margin
amounts)

  Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018 through
December 31,
2018
          January 1,
2018 through
September 30,
2018
    Year ended
December 31,
2017
    Year ended
December 31,
2016
    Three
months
ended
March 31,
2021
    Three
months
ended
March 31,
2020
 
                                  (unaudited)     (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Net income (loss)

  $ 34,533     $ 33,940     $ (871         $33,094     $ 9,022     $ 5,340     $ 16,507     $ 1,515  

Amortization of intangible assets

    18,847       18,847       4,712           —         —         —         4,712       4,712  

Offering costs(a)

    896       —         —             —         —         —         3,329       —    

Transaction related costs(b)

    —         —         5,769           3,685       —         —         —         —    

Foreign currency (gains) losses(c)

    (1,511     (2,039     (395         1,680       (432     (59     787       1,404  

Loss (gain) on disposal of assets(d)

    1,116       2,227       582           (7     17       —         27       (5

Tax benefit from transaction related costs(e)

    —         —         —             (15,861     —         —         —         —    

COVID-19 related expenses(f)

    7,541       —         —             —         —         —         2,394       2,439  

Severance costs(g)

    2,557       —         —             —         —         —         —         98  

Lease termination costs(h)

    1,815       —         —             —         —         —         —         —    

Natural disaster costs (i)

                    442       —    

Contingent consideration(j)

    3,570       —         —             —         —         —         —         —    
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

       

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted Net Income

  $ 69,364     $ 52,975     $ 9,797           $22,591     $ 8,607     $ 5,281    

 

 

$

 

 

28,198

 

 

 

 

 

 

$

 

 

10,163

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Net Income (Loss) Margin(k)

    7.2     9.4     (1.0 )%          19.6     7.7     6.7  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10.8

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1.5

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted Net Income Margin(k)

    14.5     14.7     11.4         13.4     7.3     6.6  

 

 

 

 

 

18.4

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

9.9

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

  (a)

Represents one-time professional service fees related to the preparation for a potential initial public offering that have been expensed during the period.

  (b)

Transaction related costs include professional services fees totaling $9.2 million and compensation expense for bonuses paid to certain employees for services rendered in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition totaling $0.3 million.

  (c)

Realized and unrealized foreign currency gains and losses include the effect of fair market value changes of forward contracts and remeasurement of U.S. dollar-denominated accounts to foreign currency.

  (d)

Gain and loss on disposal of assets mainly resulted from the writeoff of leasehold improvements associated with the termination of certain of our real estate leases during the year ended December 31, 2020 and moving to permanent locations and consolidation of sites in the United States during the year ended December 31, 2019.

  (e)

Tax benefit recognized for transaction related costs deducted for tax purposes but not attributable to either the Predecessor or Successor period and therefore expense recognized “on the line.”

  (f)

Represents incremental expenses incurred that relate to the transition to and operational enablement of a virtual operating model and incentive and leave pay granted to employees that are directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  (g)

Represents severance payments as a result of certain cost optimization measures we undertook during the year.

 

86


Table of Contents
  (h)

Represents one-time costs associated with the termination of lease agreements for two of our U.S. facilities attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  (i)

Represents one-time costs associated with emergency housing, transportation costs and bonuses for our employees in connection with the severe winter storm in Texas in February 2021.

  (j)

Represents non-recurring payments that are due to the sellers in the Blackstone Acquisition for certain tax benefits realized as a result of the NOL carrybacks permitted as a result of the CARES Act.

  (k)

Net Income (Loss) Margin represents net income divided by service revenue and Adjusted Net Income Margin represents Adjusted Net Income divided by service revenue.

 

(2)

EBITDA is a non-GAAP profitability measure that represents net income or loss for the period before the impact of the benefit from or provision for income taxes, financing expenses, depreciation, and amortization of intangible assets. EBITDA eliminates potential differences in performance caused by variations in capital structures (affecting financing expenses), tax positions (such as the availability of net operating losses against which to relieve taxable profits), the cost and age of tangible assets (affecting relative depreciation expense) and the extent to which intangible assets are identifiable (affecting relative amortization expense).

Adjusted EBITDA is a non-GAAP profitability measure that represents EBITDA before certain items that are considered to hinder comparison of the performance of our businesses on a period-over-period basis or with other businesses. During the periods presented, we exclude from Adjusted EBITDA offering costs, transaction related costs associated with the Blackstone Acquisition, the effect of foreign currency gains and losses, losses on disposals of assets, accelerated expense for certain unamortized debt financing costs related to the settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility, COVID-19 related expenses, severance costs, lease termination costs, natural disaster costs and contingent consideration, which include costs that are required to be expensed in accordance with GAAP, and non-recurring expenses incurred in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic. Our management believes that the inclusion of supplementary adjustments to EBITDA applied in presenting Adjusted EBITDA are appropriate to provide additional information to investors about certain material non-cash items and about unusual items that we do not expect to continue at the same level in the future.

 

87


Table of Contents

The following table reconciles net income (loss), the most directly comparable GAAP measure, to EBITDA and Adjusted EBITDA:

 

    Successor           Predecessor              
(in thousands, except
margin amounts)
  Year ended
December 31,
2020
    Year ended
December 31,
2019
    October 1,
2018
through
December 31,
2018
          January 1,
2018
through
September 30,
2018
    Year ended
December 31,
2017
    Year ended
December 31,
2016
    Three months
ended
March 31,
2021
    Three months
ended
March 31,
2020
 
                                  (unaudited)     (unaudited)     (unaudited)  

Net income (loss)

  $ 34,533     $ 33,940     $ (871       $ 33,094     $ 9,022     $ 5,340     $ 16,507     $ 1,515  

Provision for (benefit from) income taxes

    9,886       (4,411     3,379           (8,952     5,022       393       3,559       339  

Financing expenses(a)

    7,482       7,351       1,527           511       257       140       1,581       2,243  

Depreciation

    20,155       16,329       3,653           8,583       7,132       4,559       6,203       4,714  

Amortization of intangible assets

    18,847       18,847       4,712           —         —         —         4,712       4,712  

EBITDA

    90,903       72,056       12,400           33,236       21,433       10,432       32,562       13,523  

Offering costs(b)

    896       —         —             —         —         —         3,329       —    

Transaction related costs(c)

    —         —         5,769           3,685       —         —         —         —    

Foreign currency (gains) losses(d)

    (1,511     (2,039     (395         1,680       (432     (59     787       1,404  

Loss (gain) on disposal of assets(e)

    1,116       2,227       582           (7     17       —         27       (5

Settlement of 2018 Credit Facility(f)

    —         1,995       —             —         —         —         —         —    

COVID-19 related expenses(g)

    7,541       —         —             —         —         —         2,394       2,439  

Severance costs(h)

    2,557       —         —             —         —         —         —         98  

Lease termination costs(i)

    1,815       —         —             —         —         —         —         0  

Natural disaster costs(l)

                    442       —    

Contingent consideration(k)

    3,570       —         —             —         —         —         —         —    
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted EBITDA

  $ 106,887     $ 74,239     $ 18,356         $ 38,594     $ 21,018     $ 10,373     $ 39,541     $ 17,459  
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Net Income (Loss) Margin(l)

    7.2     9.4     (1.0 )%          19.6     7.7     6.7     10.8     1.5
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Adjusted EBITDA Margin(l)

    22.4     20.6     21.4         22.9     17.9     13.0       25.9     17.0
 

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

  (a)

Financing expenses include interest expense, commitment fees on undrawn amounts, and debt financing costs related to our 2018 Credit Facility and 2019 Credit Facilities. For the year ended December 31, 2019, we accelerated expense recognition for certain debt financing costs upon settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility, which were included in financing expenses in our consolidated statements of income, but which have been separately included as a non-recurring adjustment to arrive at Adjusted EBITDA.

  (b)

Represents one-time professional service fees related to the preparation for a potential initial public offering that have been expensed during the period.

  (c)

Transaction related costs include professional services fees totaling $9.2 million and compensation expense for bonuses paid to certain employees for services rendered in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition totaling $0.3 million.

  (d)

Realized and unrealized foreign currency gains and losses include the effect of fair market value changes of forward contracts and remeasurement of U.S. dollar-denominated accounts to foreign currency.

  (e)

Gain and loss on disposal of assets mainly resulted from the writeoff of leasehold improvements associated with the termination of certain of our real estate leases during the year ended December 31,

 

88


Table of Contents
  2020 and moving to permanent locations and consolidation of sites in the United States during the year ended December 31, 2019.
  (f)

Debt financing costs for which expense was accelerated upon settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility.

  (g)

Represents incremental expenses incurred that relate to the transition to and operational enablement of a virtual operating model and incentive and leave pay granted to employees that are directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  (h)

Represents severance payments as a result of certain cost optimization measures we undertook during the year.

  (i)

Represents one-time costs associated with the termination of lease agreements for two of our U.S. facilities attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  (j)

Represents one-time costs associated with emergency housing, transportation costs and bonuses for our employees in connection with the severe winter storm in Texas in February 2021.

  (k)

Represents non-recurring payments that are due to the sellers in the Blackstone Acquisition for certain tax benefits realized as a result of the NOL carrybacks permitted as a result of the CARES Act.

  (l)

Net Income (Loss) Margin represents net income divided by service revenue and Adjusted EBITDA Margin represents Adjusted EBITDA divided by service revenue.

 

89


Table of Contents

MANAGEMENT’S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS

You should read the following discussion of our results of operations and financial condition in conjunction with the section titled “Selected Historical Consolidated Financial Data” and our consolidated financial statements and related notes included elsewhere in this prospectus. The following discussion and analysis also includes a discussion of certain non-GAAP financial measures. For a description and reconciliation of the non-GAAP measures discussed in this section, see “—Non-GAAP Financial Measures” below.

This prospectus includes certain historical consolidated financial and other data for TaskUs, Inc. (“we,” “us,” “our” or the “Company”). The following discussion provides a narrative of our results of operations and financial condition for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 and the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019.

Overview

We are a digital outsourcer, focused on serving high-growth technology companies to represent, protect and grow their brands. We support some of the world’s most disruptive brands such as Zoom, Netflix, Uber, Coinbase and Oscar. As of December 31, 2020, we had over 100 clients spanning numerous industry segments within the Digital Economy, including social media, e-commerce, gaming, streaming media, food delivery and ride sharing, HiTech, FinTech and HealthTech.

Our global, omni-channel delivery model is focused on providing our clients three key services – Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and AI Operations. 96% of our revenue for the year ended December 31, 2020 was delivered from non-voice, digital channels or omni-channel services. Non-voice channels allow us to utilize resources efficiently, thereby driving higher profitability.

We have designed our platform to enable us to rapidly scale and benefit from our clients’ growth. We believe our ability to deliver “ridiculously good” outsourcing will enable us to continue to grow our client base.

At TaskUs, culture is at the heart of everything we do. Many of the companies operating in the Digital Economy are well-known for their obsession with creating a world-class employee experience. We believe clients choose TaskUs in part because they view our company culture as aligned with their own, which enables us to act as a natural extension of their brands and gives us an advantage in the recruitment of highly engaged frontline teammates who produce better results.

Business Highlights

We have a track record of delivering strong, profitable growth. From 2017 to 2020 we delivered a Revenue CAGR of 60%, a Net Income CAGR of 56% and an Adjusted EBITDA CAGR of 72%. As of March 31, 2021, we had approximately 27,500 employees across eighteen locations in eight countries.

Our growth during the year ended December 31, 2020 was characterized by uncertainty during the first half of 2020 as we experienced decreases in certain client volumes due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic temporarily increased our costs as we made investments to protect our employees, including making certain incentive and leave payments, providing personal protective equipment and buying additional hardware to enable employees to work from home. We then implemented a series of cost saving measures to protect the business, such as exiting office leases in high-cost U.S. locations and transitioning some support functions to offshore locations. These actions provided the stability and agility that we needed when our client volume rebounded during the second half of 2020 and through the first quarter of 2021. We have continued many of these investments and cost saving measures in order to position us for future growth as the COVID-19 pandemic persists.

 

90


Table of Contents

The below chart describes our history and growth in revenue since our launch in 2008.

 

 

LOGO

Recent Financial Highlights

For the three months ended March 31, 2021, we recorded service revenues of $152.9 million, or a 49.2% increase from $102.4 million for the three months ended March 31, 2020. For the year ended December 31, 2020, we recorded service revenues of $478.0 million, or a 32.9% increase from $359.7 million for the year ended December 31, 2019.

Net income for the three months ended March 31, 2021 increased 989.6% to $16.5 million from $1.5 million for the three months ended March 31, 2020. Adjusted Net Income for the three months ended March 31, 2021 increased 177.5% to $28.2 million from $10.2 million for the three months ended March 31, 2020. Adjusted EBITDA for the three months ended March 31, 2021 increased 126.5% to $39.5 million from $17.5 million for the three months ended March 31, 2020.

Net income for the year ended December 31, 2020 increased 1.7% to $34.5 million from $33.9 million for the year ended December 31, 2019. Adjusted Net Income for the year ended December 31, 2020 increased 30.9% to $69.4 million from $53.0 million for the year ended December 31, 2019. Adjusted EBITDA for the year ended December 31, 2020 increased 44.0% to $106.9 million from $74.2 million for the year ended December 31, 2019.

The operating results in any period are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for any future period.

Trends and Factors Affecting our Performance

There are a number of key factors and trends affecting our results of operations.

 

91


Table of Contents

Growing with our current clients

As of December 31, 2020, we served over 100 of the world’s leading technology companies. Between 2017 and 2020, our current clients with publicly disclosed financials grew their revenue at an estimated unweighted average CAGR of 40%. As our clients’ revenue and scale have grown at rapid rates, so have our outsourcing volumes, revenue and service relationships. Revenue from TaskUs clients who have been with us since 2017 grew by 448% through the end of 2020, based on 29 clients who generated $500,000 or more in revenue for each of those years. In addition, over 99% of our revenues in 2020 were from recurring revenue contracts.

Extending solutions with our current clients

We have a significant opportunity to enhance the penetration of current services as well as cross-sell new services. As our clients grow in size and the complexity of their outsourcing needs increases, we believe we have an opportunity to increase the addressable spend available to TaskUs. In 2020, our largest client leveraged all three of our primary service offerings and 38 current clients signed new statements of work with us.

We aim to bolster our portfolio of highly complementary service capabilities by integrating consultative expertise, process automation, and technology that further expand our value proposition to clients. Services such as Content Security, which grew at a CAGR of 157% between 2017 and 2020, anti-money laundering, fraud prevention and data science are areas we believe are particularly attractive and highly relevant for our forward-leaning technology client base.

New client wins

We are well positioned within multi-billion dollar commercial markets with massive addressable spend opportunities where we focus on culturally aligned, agile companies that plan to scale rapidly. Our world-class sales team is organized around new-economy industry verticals such as FinTech, On Demand Travel + Transportation, Entertainment + Gaming, Social Media, HiTech, HealthTech and Retail + e-Commerce. We identify emerging industry and funding trends to engage early and work with future market leaders and enterprise-class clients.

We added 36 new clients in 2020, and we achieved a 56% new client win rate for every dollar of new client opportunities we pursued. TaskUs thoughtfully enters new industry verticals, or sub-verticals, when we identify emerging trends. From 2018 to 2020 our total new client win rate was 42%.

Expanding geographically

Global presence and multilingual capabilities are of increasing importance to our multinational clients and potential clients. The number of clients working with TaskUs in multiple geographies more than doubled from 2017 to 2020. In many cases our geographic expansion is driven by specific client requests, such as an online gaming client leading us to Taiwan, supporting a European market launch in Greece, and two social media clients in Ireland and Atlanta, Georgia, respectively. New geographies mean new languages and/or capabilities to offer to our clients and increasing opportunities to win new business. We plan to continue expanding our geographic footprint to drive growth in both existing and new clients.

Our profitability is also driven by effective asset utilization, as our focus on non-voice channels lead to greater seat turns, which reflect that a single seat has the potential to be used multiple times in a 24-hour day based on the hours an employee works. In 2019, we achieved seat turns of approximately 2.0 across our sites, calculated based on the average for each month in the year of the operational headcount for each month divided by the occupied seats in each month. Seat turn metrics for 2020 are not available as we transitioned to a virtual operating model in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Further, our location strategy prioritizes expansion in lower cost offshore delivery geographies such as Philippines and India, where we are actively expanding into provincial cities. These factors have enabled us to maintain strong profitability.

 

92


Table of Contents

We have expanded our presence rapidly from nine sites in three countries as of December 31, 2017 to eighteen sites in eight countries as of March 31, 2021. In October 2019, we entered the India market with our first site in Indore, where we had approximately 3,160 employees as of March 31, 2021, and in December 2020 we entered Colombia. As we expand our geographic footprint and service offerings, we may have one-time costs that may impact profitability.

Hiring and retention of employees

In order to efficiently and effectively provide services to our clients, we must be able to quickly hire, train and retain employees. We offer our employees competitive wages with annual increases and also invest in their wellbeing. Our employee benefits and employee engagement costs may vary from period to period based on employee participation. We seek to retain sufficient employees to serve our clients’ increasing business needs and position ourselves for growth. We believe our focus on employee culture leads to lower employee attrition levels. Apart from driving our high client satisfaction and retention metrics, lower employee attrition leads to lower hiring and training costs and higher employee productivity. The voluntary attrition rate for employees who were employed by TaskUs for more than 180 days was 14.9% and 26.6% for the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019, respectively.

Foreign currency fluctuations

We are subject to foreign currency exposure, primarily related to costs from the international locations in which we have operations. In order to mitigate this exposure, we enter into foreign currency exchange rate forward contracts for the larger geographies in which we operate to reduce the volatility of forecasted cash flows denominated in foreign currencies.

COVID-19

During the first quarter of 2020, there was a global outbreak of COVID-19, which has spread to over 200 countries and territories, including all states in the United States. The global impact of the outbreak has been rapidly evolving and many countries have reacted by instituting quarantines and restrictions on travel, closing financial markets and/or restricting trading, and limiting operations of non-essential businesses. Such actions created disruption in global supply chains, increased rates of unemployment and adversely impacted many industries. The outbreak could have a continued adverse impact on economic and market conditions, and the full extent of the impact and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic will depend on future developments, including, among other factors, the duration and spread of the outbreak and the success of vaccination programs, along with related travel advisories, quarantines and restrictions, the recovery time of the disrupted supply chains and industries, the impact of labor market interruptions, the impact of government interventions, and uncertainty with respect to the duration of the global economic slowdown. We continue to closely monitor the outbreak and the impact on our operations and liquidity. As events continue to evolve and additional information becomes available, our estimates may change materially in the future.

Operational Enablement

In early March 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we mobilized a centralized crisis response team to implement a virtual operating model. We did this to protect the health and safety of our employees, and ensure continued service for our clients. The shift entailed significant challenges including reconfiguring IT infrastructure and delivering thousands of personal computers, laptops and wireless internet cards to a majority of our employees’ homes, under stringent transport restrictions. In addition, we have paused certain on-site amenities for our employees, such as free on-site meals, until all our normal operations can be safely resumed.

Aided by significant agility and effective planning by our on-ground IT and operations teams, we were able to operationalize the model swiftly: over 90% of our frontline teammates were enabled to work virtually soon after the commencement of lockdowns. As of March 31, 2021, over 90% of our frontline teammates continued to work virtually.

 

93


Table of Contents

Operating in a virtual model has required us to hire employees remotely, virtually train them and expand our network capabilities. We are observing local government mandates and guidance provided by health authorities and have proactively implemented quarantine protocols, social distancing policies, working from home arrangements, and travel suspensions. We expect to continue implementing these measures and we may take further actions if required or recommended by government authorities or if we determine them to be in the best interests of our employees, clients, and suppliers.

During the year ended December 31, 2020, we incurred costs related to these transformations. As part of our swift transition to a virtual operating model during the outbreak, we continued to pay employees who were unable to work due to logistical and technical hurdles or due to illness in order to maintain the health and financial wellbeing of our employees. We also made certain payments to employees as incentive to quickly adapt to the virtual model, which allowed us to maintain employee productivity. In total, we incurred costs of $0.3 million related to leave payments for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and $2.0 million related to incentive and leave payments for the year ended December 31, 2020, of which $1.5 million was incurred during the first quarter of 2020.

Similarly, as part of the transition to working virtually, we made additional investments in our employees in the form of internet and Wi-Fi connectivity to their homes as well as hotel and shuttle costs for employees who were displaced by the pandemic. These investments helped to ensure the sustainability of our virtual operating model when our client volume began to stabilize during the second half of 2020. We continued to make these investments in the second half of the year in order to position us for future growth as the COVID-19 pandemic persists. We incurred approximately $4.8 million of operational enablement related investments during the year ended December 31, 2020, with $3.5 million of that total cost coming in the second half of the year.

In February 2021 we announced the continuation of our company-wide work from home policy through October 2021. However, where there have been specific client requirements to return to our facilities in the Philippines and India and, where it has been safe to do so, we have begun transitioning some of our employees back to the office. We continued to incur approximately $2.1 million of operational enablement costs during the three months ended March 31, 2021.

Revenue and Sales Generation

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we saw a reduction in spend from some clients, including ride sharing, live event ticketing, movie ticketing, travel and retail companies, who experienced a decline in their end customer volumes because of lockdown restrictions globally. We also experienced slower revenue growth than expected in our AI operations service offering due to a reduction in volumes from clients whose outsourcing needs were impacted by the pandemic. Consequently, in March 2020, we lagged behind our initial revenue forecasts and adjusted our budget downward due to the uncertainty about the short-term and long-term impacts of the economic slowdown on our performance and the ongoing needs of our clients. Similarly, during the first quarter of 2020, we wrote off certain account receivables resulting in bad debt expense of $0.7 million.

Our business performance has rebounded in the second half of 2020 despite the uncertainty and initial impact of the pandemic. As some of the initial uncertainty associated with the COVID-19 pandemic began to subside, our strong market position within our industry verticals as well as our operational agility enabled us to act as a key partner to clients in industry segments such as social media, e-commerce, streaming media, gaming and food delivery, which saw an increase in demand driven by a surge in online commerce and content consumption.

As a result, we ultimately delivered strong sales performance across new and existing clients, with revenue of $152.9 million and $478.0 million for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and the year ended December 31, 2020, respectively, which was an increase of 49.2% and 32.9% compared to our revenue for the three months ended March 31, 2020 and the year ended December 31, 2019, respectively.

 

94


Table of Contents

Cash and Cost Management

On March 27, 2020, in the United States, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (the “CARES Act”) was enacted in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The CARES Act, among other things, permits net operating loss (“NOL”) carryovers and carrybacks to offset 100% of taxable income for taxable years beginning before 2021 and the deferral of employer taxes. We have chosen to avail ourselves of these CARES Act provisions for NOL carryovers and carrybacks and the deferral of employer taxes. We have carried back net operating losses originating in the period from October 1, 2018 through December 31, 2018 to claim a refund for taxes paid in fiscal 2015, 2016, 2017, and the period from January 1, 2018 through September 30, 2018 resulting in an expected benefit of approximately $5.2 million. During the year ended December 31, 2020, we deferred $5.3 million of employer taxes.

In March 2020, we also drew $39.9 million in our revolving line of credit as a liquidity precaution due to the uncertainty to our business and our clients’ businesses as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout 2020 and the first quarter of 2021 we were able to meet our liquidity needs with cash generated from operations and the funds that were drawn from the revolving credit line were not needed. We believe these actions throughout the year have appropriately prepared us to respond to continued uncertainty, and we do not have significant liquidity or operational concerns. As of March 31, 2021 we had $135.5 million of cash and $39.9 million continued to be outstanding under the revolving line of credit. We continue to closely monitor the outbreak and the impact on our operations and liquidity.

In addition to the operating interventions and CARES Act provisions discussed above, we conducted a comprehensive review of our cost structure in order to build efficiencies across functions and implemented robust working capital controls to maintain cash conversion and compliance with covenants. Throughout the year ended December 31, 2020 we incurred certain costs as a result of our cash and cost management decisions. We terminated leases for two of our U.S. sites during the second half of 2020, for which we incurred $1.8 million of termination costs. Certain cost optimizing measures to consolidate and transition some support functions in lower-cost geographies resulted in $2.6 million of severance costs for the year. We believe our active cash and cost management decisions will have long-term benefits to the goal of enabling our future growth and profitability.

As a result of the unpredictable and evolving impact of the pandemic and measures being taken around the world to combat its spread, the timing and trajectory of the recovery remain unclear at this time, and the adverse impact of the pandemic on our operations could be material. See “Risk Factors—Risks Related to Our Business and Industry—The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, including the resulting global economic uncertainty and measures taken in response to the pandemic, has adversely impacted our business, financial condition and results of operations, especially in the first half of 2020, and may continue to do so.”

Key Components of Our Results of Operations

Service Revenue

We derive revenues from the following three service offerings:

 

   

Digital Customer Experience: Principally consists of omni-channel customer care services primarily delivered through digital (non-voice) channels. Other solutions include customer care services for new product or market launches, trust & safety solutions and customer acquisition solutions.

 

   

Content Security: Principally consists of review and disposition of user and advertiser generated content for purposes which include removal or labeling of policy violating, offensive or misleading content. We are developing and enforcing Content Security policies in several areas including intellectual property, job and commerce postings, objectionable material, and political advertising.

 

   

AI Operations: Principally consists of data labeling, annotation and transcription services performed for the purpose of training and tuning AI algorithms through the process of machine learning.

 

95


Table of Contents

As these services are delivered, we bill our clients on either time-and-materials, cost-plus, unit-priced, fixed-price, or outcome oriented basis. Service revenue from time-and-materials or cost-plus contracts is recognized as the services are performed. Service revenue from unit-priced contracts is recognized monthly as transactions are processed based on objective measures of output. Service revenue from fixed-price contracts is recognized monthly as service revenue is earned and obligations are fulfilled. Service revenue from outcome oriented contracts is recognized when it is reasonably certain that the desired outcome has been achieved.

Operating Expenses

Cost of Services

Cost of services consists primarily of costs related to delivery of services, and consists primarily of personnel expenses like salaries and wages, employee welfare, employee engagement, recruiting and professional development. Additionally, cost of services includes expenses related to sites and technology costs that can be directly attributed to the delivery of services.

Selling, General, & Administrative

Selling expenses consists of personnel costs, travel expenses, and other expenses for our client services, sales and marketing teams. Additionally, it includes costs of marketing and promotional events, corporate communications, and other brand-building activities.

General and administrative expenses consist of personnel and related expenses for technology, human resources, legal, finance, global shared services, and executives including, professional fees; insurance premiums, cloud-based capabilities and other corporate expenses.

Depreciation

Depreciation is computed on the straight-line basis over the estimated useful life of our property and equipment assets, generally three to five years or, for leasehold improvements, over the term of the lease, whichever is shorter.

Amortization of intangible assets

Amortization relates to our client relationship and trade name intangibles, which are amortized over their useful lives using the straight-line method, which reflects the pattern of benefit, and assumes no residual value.

Other Income

Other income primarily consists of gains and losses resulting from changes in the fair value of the foreign currency exchange rate forward contracts that we are party to. Our forward contracts do not qualify for hedge accounting treatment. Other income also includes gains and losses resulting from the remeasurement of U.S.-denominated accounts to foreign currency and loss on sale of property and equipment.

Financing Expenses

Financing expenses primarily consist of interest expenses related to our term loans in addition to commitment fees related to the undrawn delayed draw loan and revolver loan. For the year ended December 31, 2019, we also included the write off of unamortized discounts and deferred financing costs in connection with the settlement of our 2018 Credit Facility, discussed further below under “Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness” below.

 

96


Table of Contents

Provision for (benefit from) Income Taxes

Provision for (benefit from) income taxes consists primarily of income taxes related to U.S. federal and state income taxes and income taxes in foreign jurisdictions in which we conduct business.

Results of Operations

Comparison of the Three Months Ended March 31, 2021 and 2020

The following tables set forth certain historical consolidated financial information for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020.

 

(in thousands)    Three months
ended
March 31, 2021
     Three months
ended
March 31, 2020
    Period over
Period Change
($)
    Period Over
Period Change
(%)
 

Service revenue

   $ 152,871      $ 102,429     $ 50,442       49.2

Operating expenses:

         

Cost of services

     88,030        61,783       26,247       42.5

Selling, general, and administrative expense

     31,498        25,731       5,767       22.4

Depreciation

     6,203        4,714       1,489       31.6

Amortization of intangible assets

     4,712        4,712       —         —    

Loss (gain) on disposal of assets

     27        (5     32       (640.0 )% 
  

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Total operating expenses:

     130,470        96,935       33,535       34.6

Operating income

     22,401        5,494       16,907       307.7

Other expense

     754        1,397       (643     (46.0 )% 

Financing expenses

     1,581        2,243       (662     (29.5 )% 
  

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Income before taxes

     20,066        1,854       18,212       982.3

Provision for income taxes

     3,559        339       3,220       949.9
  

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Net income

   $ 16,507      $ 1,515     $ 14,992       989.6
  

 

 

    

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

Service revenue

Service revenue for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $152.9 million and $102.4 million, respectively. Service revenue for the three months ended March 31, 2021 increased by $50.4 million or 49.2% when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020, primarily resulting from extending solutions with our current clients and new client wins related to all three of our service offerings, Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and AI Operations. The year over year growth in Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and AI Operations contributed 33.6%, 9.4%, and 6.2%, respectively, of the total increase of 49.2% for the three months ended March 31, 2021. The growth in Digital Customer Experience was primarily driven by an increase in volume of services to our existing customers and new customer wins. The growth in Content Security was primarily driven by an increase in volume of services to our existing customers. Our AI Operations service offering experienced growth of 59.6% during the three months ended March 31, 2021, which was driven by an increase in volume of services to our existing customers and new client wins.

The following table shows service revenues by service offering for each period.

 

(in thousands)    Three Months
Ended
March 31, 2021
     Three Months
Ended
March 31, 2020
     Period over
Period
Change ($)
     Period over
Period
Change (%)
 

Digital Customer Experience

   $ 99,711      $ 65,217      $ 34,494        52.9

Content Security

     36,127        26,538        9,589        36.1

AI Operations

     17,033        10,674        6,359        59.6
  

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

 

Service revenue

   $ 152,871      $ 102,429      $ 50,442        49.2
  

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

97


Table of Contents

Service revenues by delivery geography

The majority of our service revenues are derived from contracts with clients who are either located in the United States, or with clients who are located outside of the United States but whereby the contract specifies payment in United States dollars. However, we deliver our services from multiple locations around the world.

The following table presents the breakdown of our service revenues by geographical location, based on where the services are provided.

(in thousands)    Three Months
Ended
March 31, 2021
     Three Months
Ended
March 31, 2020
     Period over
Period Change
($)
     Period over
Period Change
(%)
 

Philippines

   $ 84,578      $ 55,874      $ 28,704        51.4

United States

     50,757        40,645        10,112        24.9

Rest of World

     17,536        5,910        11,626        196.7
  

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

 

Service revenue

   $ 152,871      $ 102,429      $ 50,442        49.2
  

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

 

Revenues generated from services provided from our delivery sites in the Philippines for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $84.6 million and $55.9 million, respectively. During the three months ended March 31, 2021, our service revenues from work performed out of our delivery sites in the Philippines grew 51.4% when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020. This growth resulted from expansion in all three of our service offerings, Digital Customer Experience, Content Security and AI Operations, which contributed 28.3%, 15.8%, and 7.3% of the total increase of 51.4% in the Philippines, respectively.

Revenues generated from services provided from the United States for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $50.8 million and $40.6 million, respectively. During the three months ended March 31, 2021, our service revenues from work performed out of our delivery sites in the United States grew 24.9% when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020. This growth resulted primarily from expansion in two of our service offerings, Digital Customer Experience and AI Operations, which contributed 23.0% and 4.7% of the total increase of 24.9% in the United States, respectively, partially offset by a 2.8% decrease contributed by Content Security due to the shift in revenues to the Philippines.

Revenues generated from services provided from the Rest of World for the three month ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $17.5 million and $5.9 million, respectively. During the three months ended March 31, 2021, our service revenues from work performed out of our delivery sites in the Rest of World grew 196.7% when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020. The growth was primarily driven from expansion in all three of our service offerings in India.

Operating Expenses

Cost of Services

Cost of services for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $88.0 million and $61.8 million, respectively. Cost of services for the three months ended March 31, 2021 increased by $26.2 million, or 42.5%, when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020. The change was primarily driven by an increase in personnel costs of $25.1 million, $1.0 million of costs related to the COVID-19 pandemic and $0.4 million of costs related to the severe winter storm in Texas in February 2021, partially offset by a decrease of $0.3 million in other direct charges due to the majority of the employees working from home for the three months ended March 31, 2021 as compared to March 31, 2020. The $25.1 million increase in personnel costs was primarily due to an increase in headcount to meet the demand in services from our customers. The $1.0 million increase in costs was driven by operational enablement costs related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

98


Table of Contents

Selling, general, and administrative expense

Selling, general, and administrative expense for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $31.5 million and $25.7 million, respectively. Selling, general, and administrative expense for the three months ended March 31, 2021 increased by $5.8 million, or 22.4%, when compared to the three months ended March 31, 2020. The increase was primarily driven by higher personnel costs of $2.5 million, $3.9 million of professional fees, enterprise cloud-based software capabilities of $0.5 million, and insurance expense of $0.2 million, partially offset by a decrease in COVID related charges of $0.9 million and a decrease in travel and marketing expenses of $0.4 million. The increase in personnel costs of $2.5 million was incurred across our functions in support of our growth in revenues. The increase in professional fees of $3.9 million was incurred primarily related to third parties who were engaged to assist with preparation for a potential initial public offering. The decrease in COVID related charges primarily related to bad debt expenses that were incurred for the three months ended March 31, 2020 that were not incurred in the three months ended March 31, 2021.

Depreciation

Depreciation for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $6.2 million and $4.7 million, respectively. The increase in depreciation is a result of cash outflows relating to capital expenditures of $10.1 million and $28.9 million that were made during the three months ended March 31, 2021 and the year ended December 31, 2020, respectively. The expenditures included leasehold improvements and office equipment to support the growth of our existing sites and expansion to new sites and additional technology and computer equipment in support of our company-wide work-from-home policy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Amortization of intangible assets

Amortization of intangible assets for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $4.7 million. Amortization can be attributed to the recognition of client relationship and trade name intangible assets recognized in connection with the Blackstone Acquisition that are being amortized on a straight-line basis.

Loss (gain) on disposal of assets

We recognized losses and (gains) on disposal of assets during the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 of $0.1 million and $(0.1) million, respectively. The loss recognized for the three months ended March 31, 2021 related primarily to the writeoff of furniture and fixtures associated with the termination of certain of our real estate leases and the gain recognized for the three months ended March 31, 2020 was related to the sale of a generator in the Philippines.

Other expense

Other expense for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $0.8 million and $1.4 million, respectively. Changes in other income are driven by our exposure to foreign currency exchange risk resulting from our operations in foreign geographies, primarily the Philippines, offset by economic hedges using foreign currency exchange rate forward contracts.

Financing expense

Financing expense for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $1.6 million and $2.2 million, respectively. During the three months ended March 31, 2021, we recognized interest expense of $1.5 million and amortization of debt financing fees of $0.1 million in connection with our 2019 Credit Agreement (as defined below under “—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness—2019 Credit Agreement”), which we entered into on September 25, 2019. Change in financing expense is primarily driven by the decrease in the rate of LIBOR used to calculate the interest rate of the term loan. See “—Liquidity and Capital Resources—Indebtedness—2019 Credit Agreement” for additional discussion of the Term Loan Facility.

 

99


Table of Contents

Provision for (benefit from) income taxes

Income tax expense (benefit) for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was $3.6 million and $0.3 million, respectively. Our effective tax rate for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was 18%.

The difference between the effective tax rates and the statutory rate in the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020 was primarily due to global intangible low-taxed income (“GILTI”) inclusion, foreign-derived intangible income (“FDII”) deduction, tax benefits of income tax holidays in foreign jurisdiction, and unrecognized tax benefits.

The effective tax rate in the future will depend upon the proportion of income before provision for income taxes earned in the United states and in jurisdictions with a tax rate lower than the U.S. statutory rate, as well as a number of other factors, including the impact of new legislation.

Comparison of the Years Ended December 31, 2020 and 2019

The following table sets forth our consolidated statement of income information for the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019.

 

(in thousands)    Year ended
December 31,
2020
     Year ended
December 31,
2019
     Period over
Period
Change ($)
     Period over
Period
Change (%)
 

Service revenue

   $ 478,046      $ 359,681      $ 118,365        32.9

Operating expenses:

           

Cost of services

     270,510        194,786        75,724        38.9

Selling, general, and administrative expense

     113,519        90,630        22,889        25.3

Depreciation

     20,155        16,329        3,826        23.4

Amortization of intangible assets

     18,847        18,847        —          0.0

Loss on disposal of assets

     1,116        2,227        (1,111      (49.9 )% 

Contingent consideration

     3,570        —          3,570        100.0
  

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

    

 

 

 

Total operating expenses:

     427,717        322,819        104,898        32.5

Operating income

   &n