Snap Inc - Annual Report: 2019 (Form 10-K)

UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

FORM 10-K

(Mark One)

For the fiscal year ended December 31, 2019

OR

Commission File Number 001-38017

SNAP INC.

(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)

(310) 399-3339

(Registrant’s telephone number, including area code)

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act: None

Indicate by check mark if the Registrant is a well-known seasoned issuer, as defined in Rule 405 of the Securities Act. Yes ☒ No ☐

Indicate by check mark if the Registrant is not required to file reports pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d) of the Act. Yes ☐ No ☒

Indicate by check mark whether the Registrant: (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the Registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days. Yes ☒ No ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the Registrant has submitted electronically every Interactive Data File required to be submitted pursuant to Rule 405 of Regulation S-T (§232.405 of this chapter) during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the Registrant was required to submit such files). Yes ☒ No ☐

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

If an emerging growth company, indicate by checkmark if the Registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a) of the Exchange Act. ☐

Indicate by check mark whether the Registrant is a shell company (as defined in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act). Yes ☐ No ☒

The aggregate market value of the voting and non-voting common equity held by non-affiliates of the Registrant, based on the closing price of the shares of Class A common stock on the New York Stock Exchange on June 28, 2019, the last business day of the Registrant’s most recently completed second fiscal quarter, was approximately $13.6 billion.

As of January 31, 2020, the Registrant had 1,164,739,858 shares of Class A common stock, 24,303,857 shares of Class B common stock, and 231,147,476 shares of Class C common stock outstanding.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

i

NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This Annual Report on Form 10-K contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or the Securities Act, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, or the Exchange Act, about us and our industry that involve substantial risks and uncertainties. All statements other than statements of historical facts contained in this report, including statements regarding guidance, our future results of operations or financial condition, business strategy and plans, user growth and engagement, product initiatives, and objectives of management for future operations, are forward-looking statements. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements because they contain words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “contemplate,” “continue,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “going to,” “intend,” “may,” “plan,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “should,” “target,” “will,” or “would” or the negative of these words or other similar terms or expressions. We caution you that the foregoing may not include all of the forward-looking statements made in this report.

You should not rely on forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. We have based the forward-looking statements contained in this Annual Report on Form 10-K primarily on our current expectations and projections about future events and trends that we believe may affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, and prospects. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, and other factors described in “Risk Factors” and elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, including among other things:

Moreover, we operate in a very competitive and rapidly changing environment. New risks and uncertainties emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for us to predict all risks and uncertainties that could have an impact on the forward-looking statements contained in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. The results, events, and circumstances reflected in the forward-looking statements may not be achieved or occur, and actual results, events, or circumstances could differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements.

In addition, statements that “we believe” and similar statements reflect our beliefs and opinions on the relevant subject. These statements are based on information available to us as of the date of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. And while we believe that information provides a reasonable basis for these statements, that information may be limited or incomplete. Our statements should not be read to indicate that we have conducted an exhaustive inquiry into, or review of, all relevant information. These statements are inherently uncertain, and investors are cautioned not to unduly rely on these statements.

The forward-looking statements made in this Annual Report on Form 10-K relate only to events as of the date on which the statements are made. We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements made in this report to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this report or to reflect new information or the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as required by law. We may not actually achieve the plans, intentions, or expectations disclosed in our forward-looking statements, and you should not place undue reliance on our forward-looking statements. Our forward-looking statements do not reflect the potential impact of any future acquisitions, dispositions, joint ventures, restructuring, legal settlements, or investments.

Investors and others should note that we may announce material business and financial information to our investors using our investor relations website (investor.snap.com), filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, webcasts, press releases, and conference calls. We use these mediums, including Snapchat and our website, to communicate with our members and the public about our company, our products, and other issues. It is possible that the information that we make available may be deemed to be material information. We therefore encourage investors and others interested in our company to review the information that we make available on our website.

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NOTE REGARDING USER METRICS AND OTHER DATA

We define a Daily Active User, or DAU, as a registered Snapchat user who opens the Snapchat application at least once during a defined 24-hour period. We calculate average Daily Active Users for a particular quarter by adding the number of DAUs on each day of that quarter and dividing that sum by the number of days in that quarter. DAUs are broken out by geography because markets have different characteristics. We define average revenue per user, or ARPU, as quarterly revenue divided by the average Daily Active Users. For purposes of calculating ARPU, revenue by user geography is apportioned to each region based on our determination of the geographic location in which advertising impressions are delivered, as this approximates revenue based on user activity. This allocation differs from our components of revenue disclosure in the notes to our consolidated financial statements, where revenue is based on the billing address of the advertising customer. For information concerning these metrics as measured by us, see “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.”

Unless otherwise stated, statistical information regarding our users and their activities is determined by calculating the daily average of the selected activity for the most recently completed quarter included in this report.

While these metrics are determined based on what we believe to be reasonable estimates of our user base for the applicable period of measurement, there are inherent challenges in measuring how our products are used across large populations globally. For example, there may be individuals who have unauthorized or multiple Snapchat accounts, even though we forbid that in our Terms of Service and implement measures to detect and suppress that behavior. We have not determined the number of such multiple accounts.

Changes in our products, infrastructure, mobile operating systems, or metric tracking system, or the introduction of new products, may impact our ability to accurately determine active users or other metrics and we may not determine such inaccuracies promptly. We also believe that we don’t capture all data regarding each of our active users. Technical issues may result in data not being recorded from every user’s application. For example, because some Snapchat features can be used without internet connectivity, we may not count a DAU because we don’t receive timely notice that a user has opened the Snapchat application. This undercounting may grow as we grow in Rest of World markets where users may have poor connectivity. We do not adjust our reported metrics to reflect this underreporting. We believe that we have adequate controls to collect user metrics, however, there is no uniform industry standard. We continually seek to identify these technical issues and improve both our accuracy and precision, including ensuring that our investors and others can understand the factors impacting our business, but these and new issues may continue in the future, including if there continues to be no uniform industry standard.

Some of our demographic data may be incomplete or inaccurate. For example, because users self-report their dates of birth, our age-demographic data may differ from our users’ actual ages. And because users who signed up for Snapchat before June 2013 were not asked to supply their date of birth, we exclude those users and estimate their ages based on a sample of the self-reported ages we do have. If our active users provide us with incorrect or incomplete information regarding their age or other attributes, then our estimates may prove inaccurate and fail to meet investor expectations.

In the past we have relied on third-party analytics providers to calculate our metrics, but today we rely primarily on our analytics platform that we developed and operate. We count a Daily Active User only when a user opens the application and only once per user per day. We believe this methodology more accurately measures our user engagement. We have multiple pipelines of user data that we use to determine whether a user has opened the application during a particular day, and thus is a Daily Active User. This provides redundancy in the event one pipeline of data were to become unavailable for technical reasons, and also gives us redundant data to help measure how users interact with our application.

If we fail to maintain an effective analytics platform, our metrics calculations may be inaccurate. We regularly review, have adjusted in the past, and are likely in the future to adjust our processes for calculating our internal metrics to improve their accuracy. As a result of such adjustments, our Daily Active Users or other metrics may not be comparable to those in prior periods. Our measures of Daily Active Users may differ from estimates published by third parties or from similarly titled metrics of our competitors due to differences in methodology or data used.

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PART I

Item 1. Business.

Overview

Snap Inc. is a camera company. We believe that reinventing the camera represents our greatest opportunity to improve the way that people live and communicate. We contribute to human progress by empowering people to express themselves, live in the moment, learn about the world, and have fun together.

Our flagship product, Snapchat, is a camera application that helps people communicate visually with friends and family through short videos and images called Snaps. By opening directly to the camera, we empower users to express themselves instantly. Snaps are deleted by default, so there is a lot less pressure to look pretty or perfect when creating and sending images on Snapchat. By reducing the friction typically associated with creating and sharing content, Snapchat has become one of the most-used cameras in the world.

In the way that the flashing cursor became the starting point for most products on desktop computers, we believe the camera screen will be the starting point for most products on smartphones. This is because images created by smartphone cameras contain more context and richer information than other forms of input like text entered on a keyboard. Given the magnitude of this opportunity, we invest heavily and take big risks in an attempt to create innovative and differentiated camera products that are better able to reflect and improve our life experiences.

Our Products

Camera: Snapchat opens directly to the Camera, making it easy to create a Snap and send it to friends. We offer a wide variety of creative tools, created by both us and our community, to make it easy for people to personalize and add context to their Snaps. Additionally, we also offer contextually relevant content and creative tools based on things like time, location, and objects.

Chat: The first version of our application was a chat service that made it easy to send Snaps back and forth with friends—hence the name “Snapchat.” Interacting with friends on Snapchat now includes creating and watching Stories, chatting with Groups, making voice and video calls, and communicating through a wide range of contextual stickers and Bitmojis. The content and ordering of the Chat page reflects the user’s relationships with their friends and family.

Discover: With so many Snaps created every day around the world, Discover helps surface the most interesting Stories and Shows from publishers, creators, and the community, based on a user’s subscriptions and interests.

Snap Map: Pulling down on the Camera screen brings you to a live map of your location, showing nearby friends, popular stories, and a heatmap of recent Snaps posted to Our Story. It’s a great way to see what your friends are doing and explore what is going on around the world.

Memories: Users can choose to save the Snaps they create in a searchable personal collection called Memories. Memories also lets users create Snaps and Stories from their saved Snaps as well as their camera roll.

Spectacles: One of the best ways to create Memories is by using Spectacles, our sunglasses that make Snaps. Spectacles connect seamlessly with Snapchat and capture video from a human perspective.

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Our Business

We generate revenue primarily through advertising.

Advertising Products: Our ad products are built on the same foundation that makes our consumer products successful. This means that we can take the things we learn while creating our consumer products and apply them to building innovative and engaging advertising products familiar to our community. Sponsored Lenses take advantage of the reach and scale of our augmented reality platform to create visually engaging 3D experiences. Snap Ads let advertisers tell their stories the same way our users do, using full screen videos with sound. Snap Ads also allow advertisers to integrate additional experiences and actions directly within these ad units, including watching a long-form video, visiting a website, or installing an app.

Campaign Management and Delivery: We are always working to improve the way ads are bought and delivered. We are investing heavily in our self-serve tools, which provide for automated, sophisticated, and scalable ad buying and campaign management. This helps advertisers increase their return on investment by providing more refined targeting, the ability to test and learn with different creatives or campaign attributes in real time, and the dynamics of our self-serve pricing. Additionally, our delivery framework continues to optimize relevance of ads across the entire platform by determining the best ad to show to any given user based on their real-time and historical attributes and activity. This decreases the number of wasted impressions while improving the effectiveness of the ads that are shown to our community.

Measuring Advertising Effectiveness: We offer a broad range of third-party and first-party solutions to provide analytics on campaign attributes like reach, frequency, demographics, and viewability; changes in perceptions like brand favorability or purchase intent; and lifts in actual behavior like purchases, foot traffic, app installs, and online purchases. We are constantly expanding our ability to provide more transparency to advertisers.

Our Strategy

Our strategy is to invest in product innovation and take risks to improve our camera platform. We do this in an effort to drive user engagement, which we can then monetize through advertising. We use the revenue we generate to fund future product innovation to grow our business.

We believe that the best way to compete in a world of widely distributed mobile applications is innovating to create the most engaging products. New mobile software is available to everyone immediately, and usually for free. While not all of our investments will pay off in the long run, we are willing to take risks in an attempt to create the best and most differentiated products on the market.

Visual communication and augmented reality require intensive processing and generate high bandwidth consumption by our users. As a result, our existing users tend to come from developed countries with high-end mobile devices and high-speed cellular internet. These markets also tend to have cheaper bandwidth costs, meaning that it is less expensive to serve our community in these countries. As we continue to grow in more markets around the world, we are investing heavily in making our service and technology more performant on lower end devices and working with carriers and other infrastructure partners to provide our service at a lower cost to our community.

Substantially all of our revenue comes from advertising, so our ability to generate revenue in a particular region depends on the size of its advertising market. Global advertising spend—especially mobile advertising spend—is extremely concentrated among top markets, and we see a high correlation between markets with significant and developed advertising markets and those that have a deep penetration of high-end mobile devices and high-speed cellular internet access. As such, we benefit greatly from the fact that many of our users are in markets where we have the highest capital efficiency and monetization potential, allowing us to generate revenue and cash flow that we can then invest into future product innovation.

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Our Commitment to Privacy

Our approach to privacy is simple: Be upfront, offer choices, and never forget that our community comes first.

We built Snapchat as an antidote to the context-less communication that has plagued “social media.” Not so long ago, a conversation among friends would be just that: a private communication in which you knew exactly who you were talking to, what you were talking about, and whether what you were saying was being memorialized for eternity. Somewhere along the way, social media—by prioritizing virality and permanence—sapped conversations of this valuable context and choice. When we began to communicate online, we lost some of what made communication great: spontaneity, emotion, honesty—the full range of human expression that makes us human in the first place.

We don’t think digital communication has to be this way. That’s why choice matters. We build products and services that emphasize the context of a conversation—who, when, what, and where something is being said. If you don’t have the autonomy to shape the context of a conversation, the conversation will simply be shaped by the permanent feeds that homogenize online conversations.

When you read our Privacy Policy, we hope that you’ll notice how much we care about the integrity of personal communication. For starters, we’ve written our Privacy Policy in plain language because we think it’s important that everyone understand exactly how we handle their information. Otherwise, it’s hard to make informed choices about how you communicate. We’ve also created a robust Privacy Center where we show that context and choice are more than talking points. There, we point out the many ways that users can control who sees their Snaps and Stories, we explain how long content will remain on our servers, how users can manage the information that we do have about them, and much more. There, you’ll also find our Transparency Report.

We also understand that privacy policies—no matter how ambitious—are only as good as the people and practices behind those policies. When someone trusts us to transmit or store their information, we know we have a responsibility to protect that information and we work hard to keep it secure. New features go through an intense privacy-review process—we debate pros and cons, and we work hard to build products we’re proud of and that we’ll want to use. We use Snapchat constantly, both at work and in our personal lives, and we handle user information with the same care that we want for our family, our friends, and ourselves.

Competition

We compete with other companies in every aspect of our business, particularly with companies that focus on mobile engagement and advertising. Many of these companies, such as Apple, Facebook (including Instagram and WhatsApp), Google (including YouTube), and Twitter, have significantly greater financial and human resources and, in some cases, larger user bases. Given the breadth of our product offerings, we also compete with companies that develop products or otherwise operate in the mobile, camera, communication, content, and advertising industries that offer, or will offer, products and services that may compete with Snapchat features or offerings. Our competitors span from internet technology companies and digital platforms, including advertising-supported video on demand platforms (such as Quibi), to traditional companies in print, radio, and television sectors to underlying technologies like default smartphone cameras and messaging. Additionally, our competition for engagement varies by region. For instance, we face competition from companies like Kakao, LINE, Naver (including Snow), Bytedance (including TikTok), and Tencent in Asia.

We compete to attract and retain our users’ attention, both in terms of reach and engagement. Since our products and those of our competitors are typically free, we compete based on our brand and the quality and nature of our product offerings rather than on price. As such, we invest heavily in constantly improving and expanding our product lines.

We also compete with other companies to attract and retain partners and advertisers, which depends primarily on our reach and ability to deliver a strong return on investment.

Finally, we compete to attract and retain highly talented individuals, including software engineers, designers, and product managers. Our headquarters in Santa Monica, California offers certain advantages, such as lower local recruiting competition from other companies and providing an enticing location to live, as well as certain disadvantages such as the need to recruit remotely and the need for employees to relocate to the Los Angeles area. In addition to providing competitive compensation packages, we compete for talent by fostering a culture of working hard to create great products and experiences and allowing our employees to have a direct meaningful contribution to new and exciting projects. We had 3,195 employees as of December 31, 2019.

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Technology

Our research and development efforts focus on product development, advertising technology, and large-scale infrastructure.

Product Development: We work relentlessly and invest heavily to create and improve products for our community and our partners. We develop a wide range of products related to visual communication and storytelling that are powered by a variety of new technologies.

Advertising Technology: We constantly develop and expand our advertising products and technology. In an effort to provide a strong and scalable return on investment to our advertisers, our advertising technology roadmap centers around improving our delivery framework, measurement capabilities, and our self-serve tools.

Large-scale Infrastructure: We spend considerable resources and investment on the underlying architecture that powers our products, such as optimizing the delivery of billions of videos to millions of people around the world every day. We currently partner with providers like Google and Amazon to support the infrastructure for our growing needs. These partnerships have allowed us to scale quickly without upfront infrastructure costs, letting us focus our efforts on product innovation.

Our research and development expenses were $883.5 million, $772.2 million, and $1.5 billion in 2019, 2018, and 2017, respectively. For information about our research and development expenses, see “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Results of Operations—Research and Development Expenses” of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Seasonality in Our Business

We have historically seen seasonality in our business. Overall advertising spend tends to be strongest in the fourth quarter of the calendar year, and we have observed a similar pattern in our historical revenue. We have also experienced seasonality in our user engagement, generally seeing lower engagement during summer months and higher engagement in December.

Key Customers

No individual customer represented more than 10% of our revenues in 2019, 2018, or 2017.

Intellectual Property

Our success depends in part on our ability to protect our intellectual property and proprietary technologies. To protect our proprietary rights, we rely on a combination of intellectual property rights in the United States and other jurisdictions, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secret laws, license agreements, internal procedures, and contractual provisions. We also enter into confidentiality and invention assignment agreements with our employees and contractors and sign confidentiality agreements with third parties. Our internal controls restrict access to proprietary technology.

As of December 31, 2019, we had approximately 600 issued patents and approximately 1,100 filed patent applications in the United States and foreign countries relating to our camera platform and other technologies. Our issued patents will expire between 2020 and 2038. We may not be able to obtain protection for our intellectual property, and our existing and future patents, trademarks, and other intellectual property rights may not provide us with competitive advantages or distinguish our products and services from those of our competitors. Our patent applications may not result in the issuance of patents, and any resulting issued patents may have claims narrower than those in our patent applications. Additionally, our current and future patents, trademarks, and other intellectual property rights may be contested, circumvented, or found unenforceable or invalid, and we may not be able to prevent third parties from infringing them. Our internal controls and contractual provisions may not always be effective at preventing unauthorized parties from obtaining our intellectual property and proprietary technologies.

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We license content, trademarks, technology, and other intellectual property from our partners, and rely on our license agreements with those partners to use the intellectual property. We also enter into licensing agreements with third parties to receive rights to patents and other know-how. Third parties may assert claims related to intellectual property rights against our partners or us.

Other companies and “non-practicing entities” that own patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, and other intellectual property rights related to the mobile, camera, communication, content, internet, and other technology-related industries frequently enter into litigation based on allegations of infringement, misappropriation, and other violations of intellectual property or other rights. Third parties, including our competitors and non-practicing entities, have and may continue to make claims from time to time that we have infringed their patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, or other intellectual property rights. We are party to many agreements under which we are obligated to indemnify our customers, suppliers, and channel partners against such claims. As our business continues to grow and competition increases, we will likely face more claims related to intellectual property and litigation matters.

Government Regulation

We are subject to many U.S. federal and state and foreign laws and regulations, including those related to privacy, rights of publicity, data protection, content regulation, intellectual property, health and safety, competition, protection of minors, consumer protection, and taxation. These laws and regulations are constantly evolving and may be interpreted, applied, created, or amended in a manner that could harm our business.

In December 2014, the Federal Trade Commission resolved an investigation into some of our early practices by handing down a final order. That order requires, among other things, that we establish a robust privacy program to govern how we treat user data. During the 20-year lifespan of the order, we must complete biennial independent privacy audits. In June 2014, we entered into a 10-year assurance of discontinuance with the Attorney General of Maryland implementing similar practices, including measures to prevent minors from creating accounts and providing annual compliance reports. Violating existing or future regulatory orders or consent decrees could subject us to substantial monetary fines and other penalties that could negatively affect our financial condition and results of operations.

Furthermore, foreign data protection, privacy, consumer protection, content regulation, and other laws and regulations are often more restrictive than those in the United States. It is possible that certain governments may seek to block or limit our products or otherwise impose other restrictions that may affect the accessibility or usability of any or all our products for an extended period of time or indefinitely. Not all of our products are available in all locations and may not be due to such laws and regulations. We have a public policy team that monitors legal and regulatory developments in the United States, as well as many foreign countries, and communicates with policymakers and regulators in the United States and internationally.

Corporate Information

We were formed as Future Freshman, LLC, a California limited liability company, in 2010. We changed our name to Toyopa Group, LLC in 2011, incorporated as Snapchat, Inc., a Delaware corporation, in 2012, and changed our name to Snap Inc. in 2016. We completed our initial public offering in March 2017 and our Class A common stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, or NYSE, under the symbol “SNAP.”

Our principal executive offices are located at 2772 Donald Douglas Loop North, Santa Monica, California 90405, and our telephone number is (310) 399-3339. Snap Inc., “Snapchat,” and our other registered and common-law trade names, trademarks, and service marks appearing in this Annual Report on Form 10-K are property of Snap Inc. or our subsidiaries.

Information about Segment and Geographic Revenue

Information about segment and geographic revenue is set forth in Notes 1 and 2 of the notes to our consolidated financial statements included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

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Available Information

Our website address is www.snap.com. Our Annual Report on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K, and amendments to these reports filed pursuant to Sections 13(a) and 15(d) of the Exchange Act are filed with the SEC. Such reports and other information filed or furnished by us with the SEC are available free of charge on our website at investor.snap.com when such reports are available on the SEC’s website. We use our website, including investor.snap.com, as a means of disclosing material non-public information and for complying with our disclosure obligations under Regulation FD.

Information contained in, or accessible through, the websites referred to in this Annual Report on Form 10-K is not incorporated into this filing. Further, our references to website addresses are only as inactive textual references.

Item 1A. Risk Factors.

You should carefully consider the risks and uncertainties described below, together with all the other information in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, including “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and the consolidated financial statements and the related notes. If any of the following risks actually occurs, our business, reputation, financial condition, results of operations, revenue, and future prospects could be seriously harmed. The risks and uncertainties described below are not the only ones we face. Additional risks and uncertainties that we are unaware of, or that we currently believe are not material, may also become important factors that adversely affect our business. Unless otherwise indicated, references to our business being seriously harmed in these risk factors will include harm to our business, reputation, financial condition, results of operations, revenue, and future prospects. In that event, the market price of our Class A common stock could decline, and you could lose part or all of your investment.

Risks Related to Our Business and Industry

Our ecosystem of users, advertisers, and partners depends on the engagement of our user base. We have seen the growth rate of our user base decline in the past and it may do so again in the future. If we fail to retain current users or add new users, or if our users engage less with Snapchat, our business would be seriously harmed.

We had 218 million Daily Active Users on average in the quarter ended December 31, 2019. We view DAUs as a critical measure of our user engagement, and adding, maintaining, and engaging DAUs have been and will continue to be necessary. Our DAUs and DAU growth rate have declined in the past and they may decline in the future due to various factors, including as the size of our active user base increases, as we achieve higher market penetration rates, as we face continued competition for our users and their time, or if there are performance issues with our application. For example, in 2018, we believe our DAUs declined primarily due to changes in the design of our application and continued performance issues with the Android version of our application. In addition, if and when we achieve maximum market penetration rates among younger users in developed markets who use smartphones with iOS operating systems, future growth in DAUs will need to come from older users, developing markets, or users with Android operating systems, which may not be possible or may be more difficult or time consuming for us to achieve. While we may experience periods when our DAUs increase due to products and services with short-term popularity, we may not always be able to attract new users, retain existing users, or maintain or increase the frequency and duration of their engagement if current or potential new users do not perceive our products to be fun, engaging, and useful. In addition, because our products typically require high bandwidth data capabilities, the majority of our users live in countries with high-end mobile device penetration and high bandwidth capacity cellular networks with large coverage areas. We therefore do not expect to experience rapid user growth or engagement in countries with low smartphone penetration even if such countries have well-established and high bandwidth capacity cellular networks. We may also not experience rapid user growth or engagement in countries where, even though smartphone penetration is high, due to the lack of sufficient cellular based data networks, consumers rely heavily on Wi-Fi and may not access our products regularly throughout the day. If our DAU growth rate slows or becomes stagnant, or we have a decline in DAUs, our financial performance will increasingly depend on our ability to elevate user activity or increase the monetization of our users.

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Snapchat is free and easy to join, the barrier to entry for new entrants in our business is low, and the switching costs to another platform are also low. Moreover, the majority of our users are 18-34 years old. This demographic may be less brand loyal and more likely to follow trends, including viral trends, than other demographics. These factors may lead users to switch to another product, which would negatively affect our user retention, growth, and engagement. Snapchat also may not be able to penetrate other demographics in a meaningful manner. Falling user retention, growth, or engagement could make Snapchat less attractive to advertisers and partners, which may seriously harm our business. In addition, we continue to compete with other companies to attract and retain our users’ attention. We calculate average DAUs for a particular quarter by adding the number of DAUs on each day of that quarter and dividing that sum by the number of days in that quarter. This calculation may mask any individual days or months within the quarter that are significantly higher or lower than the average. There are many factors that could negatively affect user retention, growth, and engagement, including if:

Any decrease to user retention, growth, or engagement could render our products less attractive to users, advertisers, or partners, and would seriously harm our business.

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Snapchat depends on effectively operating with mobile operating systems, hardware, networks, regulations, and standards that we do not control. Changes in our products or to those operating systems, hardware, networks, regulations, or standards may seriously harm our user retention, growth, and engagement.

Because Snapchat is used primarily on mobile devices, the application must remain interoperable with popular mobile operating systems, Android and iOS, application stores, and related hardware, including mobile-device cameras. The owners and operators of such operating systems and application stores, primarily Google and Apple, each have approval authority over our products and provide consumers with products that compete with ours. Additionally, mobile devices and mobile-device cameras are manufactured by a wide array of companies. Those companies have no obligation to test the interoperability of new mobile devices or mobile-device cameras with Snapchat, and may produce new products that are incompatible with or not optimal for Snapchat. We have no control over these operating systems, application stores, or hardware, and any changes to these systems or hardware that degrade our products’ functionality, or give preferential treatment to competitive products, could seriously harm Snapchat usage on mobile devices. Our competitors that control the operating systems and related hardware our application runs on could make interoperability of our products with those mobile operating systems more difficult or display their competitive offerings more prominently than ours. Additionally, our competitors that control the standards for the application stores for their operating systems could make Snapchat, or certain features of Snapchat, inaccessible for a potentially significant period of time. We plan to continue to introduce new products and features regularly and have experienced that it takes time to optimize such products and features to function with these operating systems, hardware, and standards, impacting the popularity of such products, and we expect this trend to continue.

The majority of our user engagement is on smartphones with iOS operating systems. As a result, although our products work with Android mobile devices, we historically prioritized development of our products to operate with iOS operating systems rather than smartphones with Android operating systems. To maintain and continue growth in user engagement, we have and will continue to prioritize improving our products’ operability on smartphones with Android operating systems. In 2018, we believe our DAUs declined partially due to performance issues with the Android version of our application. If we are unable to continue to improve the operability of our products on smartphones with Android operating systems or if improvements to our products do not retain existing users or attract new users, our business could be seriously harmed.

Moreover, our products require high-bandwidth data capabilities. If the costs of data usage increase or access to cellular networks is limited, our user retention, growth, and engagement may be seriously harmed. Additionally, to deliver high-quality video and other content over mobile cellular networks, our products must work well with a range of mobile technologies, systems, networks, regulations, and standards that we do not control. In particular, any future changes to the iOS or Android operating systems or application stores may impact the accessibility, speed, functionality, and other performance aspects of our products and features, and result in issues in the future from time to time. In addition, the proposal or adoption of any laws, regulations, or initiatives that adversely affect the growth, popularity, or use of the internet, including laws governing internet neutrality, could decrease the demand for our products and increase our cost of doing business.

For example, in January 2018, the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, released an order that repealed the “open internet rules,” which prohibit mobile providers in the United States from impeding access to most content, or otherwise unfairly discriminating against content providers like us and also prohibit mobile providers from entering into arrangements with specific content providers for faster or better access over their data networks. The FCC order repealing the open internet rules went into effect in June 2018. We cannot predict whether the FCC order or state initiatives regulating providers will be modified, overturned, or vacated by legal action, federal legislation, or the FCC, or the degree to which this repeal would adversely affect our business, if at all. Similarly, the European Union requires equal access to internet content, but as part of its Digital Single Market initiative, the European Union may impose network security, disability access, or 911-like obligations on “over-the-top” services if we are considered to be such a service, which could increase our costs. If the FCC’s repeal of the open internet rules is maintained, state initiatives are modified, overturned, or vacated, or the European Union modifies these open internet rules, mobile and internet providers may be able to limit our users’ ability to access Snapchat or make Snapchat a less attractive alternative to our competitors’ applications. Were that to happen, our ability to retain existing users or attract new users may be impaired, and our business would be seriously harmed.

We may not successfully cultivate relationships with key industry participants or develop products that operate effectively with these technologies, systems, networks, regulations, or standards. If it becomes more difficult for our users to access and use Snapchat on their mobile devices, if our users choose not to access or use Snapchat on their mobile devices, or if our users choose to use mobile products that do not offer access to Snapchat, our business and user retention, growth, and engagement could be seriously harmed.

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We rely on Google Cloud and Amazon Web Services, or AWS, for the vast majority of our computing, storage, bandwidth, and other services. Any disruption of or interference with our use of either platform would negatively affect our operations and seriously harm our business.

Google and Amazon provide distributed computing infrastructure platforms for business operations, or what is commonly referred to as a “cloud” computing service. We currently run the vast majority of our computing on Google Cloud and AWS, and our systems are not fully redundant on the two platforms. Any transition of the cloud services currently provided by either Google Cloud or AWS to the other platform or to another cloud provider would be difficult to implement and will cause us to incur significant time and expense. We have committed to spend $2.0 billion with Google Cloud over five years and $1.1 billion with AWS over six years, in each case beginning January 2017, and have built our software and computer systems to use computing, storage capabilities, bandwidth, and other services provided by Google and AWS. Given this, any significant disruption of or interference with our use of Google Cloud or AWS would negatively impact our operations and our business would be seriously harmed. If our users or partners are not able to access Snapchat or specific Snapchat features, or encounter difficulties in doing so, due to issues or disruptions with Google Cloud or AWS, we may lose users, partners, or advertising revenue. The level of service provided by Google Cloud and AWS or similar providers may also impact our users’, advertisers’, and partners’ usage of and satisfaction with Snapchat and could seriously harm our business and reputation. If Google Cloud, AWS, or similar providers experience interruptions in service regularly or for a prolonged basis, or other similar issues, our business would be seriously harmed. Hosting costs also have and will continue to increase as our user base and user engagement grows and may seriously harm our business if we are unable to grow our revenues faster than the cost of utilizing the services of Google Cloud, AWS, or similar providers.

In addition, each of Google and Amazon may take actions beyond our control that could seriously harm our business, including:

Google and Amazon each has broad discretion to change and interpret its terms of service and other policies with respect to us, and those actions may be unfavorable to us. They may also alter how we are able to process data on their cloud platforms. If Google or Amazon makes changes or interpretations that are unfavorable to us, our business could be seriously harmed.

We generate substantially all of our revenue from advertising. The failure to attract new advertisers, the loss of advertisers, or a reduction in how much they spend could seriously harm our business.

Substantially all of our revenue is generated from third parties advertising on Snapchat, a trend that we expect to continue. For the years ended December 31, 2019, 2018, and 2017, advertising revenue accounted for 98%, 99%, and 97% of total revenue, respectively. Although we have and continue to try to establish longer-term advertising commitments with advertisers, most advertisers do not have long-term advertising commitments with us, and our efforts to establish long-term commitments may not succeed.

We are still early in developing our advertising business. Our advertising customers vary from small businesses to well-known brands. Many of our customers only recently started working with us and spend a relatively small portion of their overall advertising budget with us, but some customers have devoted meaningful budgets that contribute to our total revenue. Still, no individual customer accounts for more than 10% of our annual revenue. In addition, advertisers may view some of our products as experimental and unproven. Advertisers will not continue to do business with us if we do not deliver advertisements in an effective manner, or if they do not believe that their investment in advertising with us will generate a competitive return relative to other alternatives. As our business continues to develop, including globally, there may be new or existing advertisers or resellers, or advertisers or resellers from different geographic regions that contribute more significantly to our total revenue. For example, greater China represented more than 10% of our revenue for the three months ended September 30, 2019. Any economic or political instability in a specific country or region may negatively impact our customers and their budgets with us, and our business would be seriously harmed.

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Moreover, we rely heavily on our ability to collect and disclose data and metrics to and for our advertisers to attract new advertisers and retain existing advertisers. Any restriction, whether by law, regulation, policy, or other reason, on our ability to collect and disclose data and metrics which our advertisers find useful would impede our ability to attract and retain advertisers. For example, the General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR, in the European Union, which went into effect in May 2018, expanded the rights of individuals to control how their personal data is collected and processed, and placed restrictions on the use of personal data of younger minors. In addition, the California Consumer Privacy Act, or CCPA, went into effect in January 2020 and places additional requirements on the handling of personal data for us, our partners, and our advertisers. The CCPA also provides for civil penalties for violations, as well as a private right of action for data breaches, which may increase the likelihood and cost of data breach litigation. The potential effects of this legislation are far-reaching and may require us to modify our data processing practices and policies and incur substantial costs and expenses in an effort to comply. Other state and federal legislative and regulatory bodies are considering similar legislation on how to handle personal data. Such restrictions could have an adverse effect on our ability to target and measure ads, and could reduce the demand or the pricing for our advertising products. Such adverse effects could be particularly material to us because we are still early in building our advertising business. Our advertising revenue could be seriously harmed by many other factors, including:

These and other factors could reduce demand for our advertising products, which may lower the prices we receive, or cause advertisers to stop advertising with us altogether. Either of these would seriously harm our business.

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Our two co-founders have control over all stockholder decisions because they control a substantial majority of our voting stock.

Our two co-founders, Evan Spiegel and Robert Murphy, own or control voting shares of our capital stock that represent approximately 99% of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock as of December 31, 2019. Mr. Spiegel alone can exercise voting control over a majority of our voting power. In 2016, Mr. Spiegel was granted RSUs for 37,447,817 shares of Class C common stock that vested on the closing of our initial public offering, or IPO, with such shares delivered to Mr. Spiegel in quarterly installments over three years beginning in November 2017. Shares of Class C common stock are entitled to 10 votes per share, so as additional quarterly installments of these Class C shares are delivered to Mr. Spiegel his voting power will increase, as will the collective voting power held by our co-founders. As a result, Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy, or in many instances Mr. Spiegel acting alone, have the ability to control the outcome of all matters submitted to our stockholders for approval, including the election, removal, and replacement of our directors and any merger, consolidation, or sale of all or substantially all of our assets.

If Mr. Spiegel’s or Mr. Murphy’s employment with us is terminated, they will continue to have the ability to exercise the same significant voting power and potentially control the outcome of all matters submitted to our stockholders for approval. Either of our co-founders’ shares of Class C common stock will automatically convert into Class B common stock, on a one-to-one basis, nine months following his death or on the date on which the number of outstanding shares of Class C common stock held by such holder represents less than 30% of the Class C common stock held by such holder on the closing of our IPO, or 32,383,178 shares of Class C common stock. Should either of our co-founders’ Class C common stock be converted to Class B common stock, the remaining co-founder will be able to exercise voting control over our outstanding capital stock. Moreover, Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy have entered into a proxy agreement under which each has granted to the other a voting proxy with respect to all shares of our Class B common stock and Class C common stock that each may beneficially own from time to time or have voting control over. The proxy would become effective on either founder’s death or disability. Accordingly, on the death or incapacity of either Mr. Spiegel or Mr. Murphy, the other could individually control nearly all of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock.

In addition, in October 2016, we issued a dividend of one share of non-voting Class A common stock to all our equity holders, which will prolong our co-founders’ voting control because our co-founders will be able to liquidate their holdings of non-voting Class A common stock without diminishing their voting control. In the future, our board of directors may, from time to time, decide to issue special or regular stock dividends in the form of Class A common stock, and if we do so our co-founders’ control could be further prolonged. This concentrated control could delay, defer, or prevent a change of control, merger, consolidation, or sale of all or substantially all of our assets that our other stockholders support. Conversely, this concentrated control could allow our co-founders to consummate such a transaction that our other stockholders do not support. In addition, our co-founders may make long-term strategic investment decisions and take risks that may not be successful and may seriously harm our business.

As our Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Spiegel has control over our day-to-day management and the implementation of major strategic investments of our company, subject to authorization and oversight by our board of directors. As board members and officers, Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy owe a fiduciary duty to our stockholders and must act in good faith in a manner they reasonably believe to be in the best interests of our stockholders. As stockholders, even controlling stockholders, Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy are entitled to vote their shares, and shares over which they have voting control, in their own interests, which may not always be in the interests of our stockholders generally. We have not elected to take advantage of the “controlled company” exemption to the corporate governance rules for companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange, or NYSE.

If we do not develop successful new products or improve existing ones, our business will suffer. We may also invest in new lines of business that could fail to attract or retain users or generate revenue.

Our ability to engage, retain, and increase our user base and to increase our revenue will depend heavily on our ability to successfully create new products, both independently and together with third parties. We may introduce significant changes to our existing products or develop and introduce new and unproven products and services, including technologies with which we have little or no prior development or operating experience. These new products and updates may fail to increase the engagement of our users, advertisers, or partners, and may even result in short-term or long-term decreases in such engagement by disrupting existing user, advertiser, or partner behavior or by introducing performance and quality issues. For example, beginning in 2017, we started transitioning our advertising sales to a self-serve platform, which decreased average advertising prices. In 2018, we believe our DAUs declined primarily due to changes in the design of our application and continued performance issues with the Android version of our application. In addition, we continue to compete with other companies to attract and retain our users’ attention. The short- and long-term impact of any major change,

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like our early 2018 application redesign and the rewrite of our application for Android users in 2019, or even a less significant change such as a refresh of the application or a feature change, is difficult to predict. Although we believe that these decisions will benefit the aggregate user experience and improve our financial performance over the long term, we may experience disruptions or declines in our DAUs or user activity. Product innovation is inherently volatile, and if new or enhanced products fail to engage our users, advertisers, or partners, or if we fail to give our users meaningful reasons to return to our application, we may fail to attract or retain users or to generate sufficient revenue, operating margin, or other value to justify our investments, any of which may seriously harm our business in the short term, long term, or both. Additionally, we frequently launch new products and the products that we launch may have technical issues that diminish the performance of our application. These performance issues or issues that we encounter in the future could impact our user engagement.

Because our products created new ways of communicating, they have often required users to learn new behaviors to use our products, or to use our products repeatedly to receive the most benefit. These new behaviors, such as swiping and tapping in the Snapchat application, are not always intuitive to users. This can create a lag in adoption of new products and new user additions related to new products. To date, this has not hindered our user growth or engagement, but that may be the result of a large portion of our user base being in a younger demographic and more willing to invest the time to learn to use our products most effectively. To the extent that future users, including those in older demographics, are less willing to invest the time to learn to use our products, and if we are unable to make our products easier to learn to use, our user growth or engagement could be affected, and our business could be harmed. We may develop new products that increase user engagement and costs without increasing revenue. For example, in 2016, we introduced Memories, our cloud storage service for Snaps, which increases our storage costs but does not currently generate revenue.

In addition, we have invested and expect to continue to invest in new lines of business, new products, and other initiatives to generate revenue and increase our user base and user activity. For example, in 2019 we launched Snap Games, a live, multi-player gaming experience, on Snapchat. There is no guarantee that such new lines of business, new products, and other initiatives will succeed or provide positive returns on our investment. If we do not successfully develop new approaches to monetization or meet the expectations of our users or partners, we may not be able to maintain or grow our revenue as anticipated or recover any associated development costs, and our business could be seriously harmed.

Our business is highly competitive. We face significant competition that we anticipate will continue to intensify. If we are not able to maintain or improve our market share, our business could suffer.

We face significant competition in almost every aspect of our business both domestically and internationally. This ranges from smaller or newer companies to larger more established companies such as Apple, Facebook (including Instagram and WhatsApp), Google (including YouTube), Twitter, Kakao, LINE, Naver (including Snow), Bytedance (including TikTok), and Tencent, which provide their users with a variety of products, services, content, and online advertising offerings, and advertising-supported video on demand platforms (such as Quibi) that offer, or will offer, products and services that may compete with Snapchat features or offerings. For example, Instagram, a competing application owned by Facebook, has incorporated many of our features, including a “stories” feature that largely mimics our Stories feature and may be directly competitive. Facebook has introduced, and likely will continue to introduce, more private ephemeral products into its various platforms which mimic other aspects of Snapchat’s core use case. We may also lose users to companies that offer products and services that compete with specific Snapchat features because of the low cost for our users to switch to a different product or service. Moreover, in emerging international markets, where mobile devices often lack large storage capabilities, we may compete with other applications for the limited space available on a user’s mobile device. We also face competition from traditional and online media businesses for advertising budgets. We compete broadly with the social media offerings of Apple, Bytedance, Facebook, Google, Pinterest, and Twitter, and with other, largely regional, social media platforms that have strong positions in particular countries. As we introduce new products, as our existing products evolve, or as other companies introduce new products and services, we may become subject to additional competition.

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Many of our current and potential competitors have significantly greater resources and broader global recognition and occupy stronger competitive positions in certain market segments than we do. These factors may allow our competitors to respond to new or emerging technologies and changes in market requirements better than we can, undertake more far-reaching and successful product development efforts or marketing campaigns, or adopt more aggressive pricing policies. In addition, advertisers may use information that our users share through Snapchat to develop or work with competitors to develop products or features that compete with us. Certain competitors, including Apple, Facebook, and Google, could use strong or dominant positions in one or more market segments to gain competitive advantages against us in areas where we operate, including by:

As a result, our competitors may acquire and engage users at the expense of our user growth or engagement, which may seriously harm our business.

We believe that our ability to compete effectively depends on many factors, many of which are beyond our control, including:

If we cannot effectively compete, our user engagement may decrease, which could make us less attractive to users, advertisers, and partners and seriously harm our business.

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We have incurred operating losses in the past, and may never achieve or maintain profitability.

We began commercial operations in 2011 and for all of our history we have experienced net losses and negative cash flows from operations. As of December 31, 2019, we had an accumulated deficit of $6.9 billion and for the year ended December 31, 2019, we experienced a net loss of $1.0 billion. We expect our operating expenses to increase in the future as we expand our operations. If our revenue does not grow at a greater rate than our expenses, we will not be able to achieve and maintain profitability. We may incur significant losses in the future for many reasons, including due to the other risks and uncertainties described in this report. Additionally, we may encounter unforeseen expenses, operating delays, or other unknown factors that may result in losses in future periods. If our expenses exceed our revenue, our business may be seriously harmed and we may never achieve or maintain profitability.

The loss of one or more of our key personnel, or our failure to attract and retain other highly qualified personnel in the future, could seriously harm our business.

We depend on the continued services and performance of our key personnel, including Evan Spiegel and Robert Murphy. Although we have entered into employment agreements with Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy, the agreements are at-will, which means that they may resign or could be terminated for any reason at any time. Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy are high profile individuals who have received threats in the past and are likely to continue to receive threats in the future. Mr. Spiegel, as Chief Executive Officer, has been responsible for our company’s strategic vision and Mr. Murphy, as Chief Technology Officer, developed the Snapchat application’s technical foundation. Should either of them stop working for us for any reason, it is unlikely that the other co-founder would be able to fulfill all of the responsibilities of the departing co-founder nor is it likely that we would be able to immediately find a suitable replacement. The loss of key personnel, including members of management and key engineering, product development, marketing, and sales personnel, could disrupt our operations, adversely impact employee retention and morale, and seriously harm our business.

As we continue to grow, we cannot guarantee we will continue to attract and retain the personnel we need to maintain our competitive position. In particular, because we are headquartered in Los Angeles, we face significant competition in hiring and attracting qualified engineers, designers, and sales personnel to move to the Los Angeles area.

As we mature, or if our stock price declines, our equity awards may not be as effective an incentive to attract, retain, and motivate employees. Additionally, many of our current employees received substantial amounts of our capital stock on or after our IPO, giving them a substantial amount of personal wealth, which can lead to an increase in attrition. As a result, it may be difficult for us to continue to retain and motivate these employees, and this wealth could affect their decision about whether they continue to work for us. Additionally, if we issue significant equity to attract and retain employees, we would incur substantial additional stock-based compensation expense and the ownership of our existing stockholders would be further diluted. If we do not succeed in attracting, hiring, and integrating excellent personnel, or retaining and motivating existing personnel, we may be unable to grow effectively and our business could be seriously harmed.

We have a short operating history and a continually evolving business model, which makes it difficult to evaluate our prospects and future financial results and increases the risk that we will not be successful.

We began commercial operations in 2011 and began meaningfully monetizing Snapchat in 2015. We started transitioning our advertising sales to a self-serve platform in 2017. We have a short operating history and a continually evolving business model, based on reinventing the camera to improve the way that people live and communicate, which makes it difficult to effectively assess our future prospects. Accordingly, we believe that investors’ future perceptions and expectations, which can be idiosyncratic and vary widely, and which we do not control, will affect our stock price. You should consider our business and prospects in light of the challenges we face, including the ones discussed in this section.

If our security is compromised or if our platform is subjected to attacks that frustrate or thwart our users’ ability to access our products and services, our users, advertisers, and partners may cut back on or stop using our products and services altogether, which could seriously harm our business.

Our efforts to protect the information that our users have shared with us may be unsuccessful due to the actions of third parties, software bugs or other technical malfunctions, employee error or malfeasance, or other factors. In addition, third parties may attempt to fraudulently induce employees or users to disclose information to gain access to our data or our users’ data. If any of these events occur, our or our users’ information could be accessed or disclosed improperly. We have previously suffered the loss of employee information related to an employee error. Our Privacy Policy governs how we may use and share the information that our users have provided us. Some advertisers and partners may store information that we share with them. If these third parties fail to implement adequate data-security practices or fail to comply with our terms and policies, our users’ data may be improperly accessed or disclosed. And even if these third parties take all these steps, their networks may still suffer a breach, which could compromise our users’ data.

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Any incidents where our users’ information is accessed without authorization, or is improperly used, or incidents that violate our Terms of Service or policies, could damage our reputation and our brand and diminish our competitive position. In addition, affected users or government authorities could initiate legal or regulatory action against us over those incidents, which could be time-consuming and cause us to incur significant expense and liability or result in orders or consent decrees forcing us to modify our business practices. Maintaining the trust of our users is important to sustain our growth, retention, and user engagement. Concerns over our privacy practices, whether actual or unfounded, could damage our reputation and brand and deter users, advertisers, and partners from using our products and services. Any of these occurrences could seriously harm our business.

We are also subject to many federal, state, and foreign laws and regulations, including those related to privacy, rights of publicity, content, data protection, intellectual property, health and safety, competition, protection of minors, consumer protection, employment, and taxation. These laws and regulations are constantly evolving and may be interpreted, applied, created, or amended in a manner that could seriously harm our business.

In addition, in December 2014, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, or the FTC, resolved an investigation into some of our early practices by issuing a final order. That order requires, among other things, that we establish a robust privacy program to govern how we treat user data. During the 20-year term of the order, we must complete biennial independent privacy audits. In addition, in June 2014, we entered into a 10-year assurance of discontinuance with the Attorney General of Maryland implementing similar practices, including measures to prevent minors under the age of 13 from creating accounts and providing annual compliance reports. Violating existing or future regulatory orders or consent decrees could subject us to substantial monetary fines and other penalties that could seriously harm our business.

Our user metrics and other estimates are subject to inherent challenges in measurement, and real or perceived inaccuracies in those metrics may seriously harm and negatively affect our reputation and our business.

We regularly review metrics, including our DAUs and ARPU metrics, to evaluate growth trends, measure our performance, and make strategic decisions. These metrics are calculated using internal company data gathered on an analytics platform that we developed and operate and have not been validated by an independent third party. While these metrics are based on what we believe to be reasonable estimates of our user base for the applicable period of measurement, there are inherent challenges in measuring how our products are used across large populations globally. For example, there may be individuals who have multiple Snapchat accounts, even though we forbid that in our Terms of Service and implement measures to detect and suppress that behavior. Our user metrics are also affected by technology on certain mobile devices that automatically runs in the background of our Snapchat application when another phone function is used, and this activity can cause our system to miscount the user metrics associated with such account.

Some of our demographic data may be incomplete or inaccurate. For example, because users self-report their dates of birth, our age-demographic data may differ from our users’ actual ages. And because users who signed up for Snapchat before June 2013 were not asked to supply their date of birth, we exclude those users and estimate their ages based on a sample of the self-reported ages we do have. If our users provide us with incorrect or incomplete information regarding their age or other attributes, then our estimates may prove inaccurate and fail to meet investor or advertiser expectations.

Errors or inaccuracies in our metrics or data could also result in incorrect business decisions and inefficiencies. For instance, if a significant understatement or overstatement of active users were to occur, we may expend resources to implement unnecessary business measures or fail to take required actions to attract a sufficient number of users to satisfy our growth strategies. We count a DAU when a user opens the application and only once per user per day. We have multiple pipelines of user data that we use to determine whether a user has opened the application during a particular day, and thus is a DAU. This provides redundancy in the event one pipeline of data were to become unavailable for technical reasons, and also gives us redundant data to help measure how users interact with our application. However, we believe that we do not capture all data regarding our active users, which may result in understated metrics. This generally occurs because of technical issues, like when our systems do not record data from a user’s application or when a user opens the Snapchat application and contacts our servers but is not recorded as an active user. We continually seek to address these technical issues and improve our accuracy, such as comparing our active users and other metrics with data received from other pipelines, including data recorded by our servers and systems. But given the complexity of the systems involved and the rapidly changing nature of mobile devices and systems, we expect these issues to continue, particularly if we continue to expand in parts of the world where mobile data systems and connections are less stable. If advertisers, partners, or investors do not perceive our user, geographic, or other demographic metrics to be accurate representations of our user base, or if we discover material inaccuracies in our user, geographic, or other demographic metrics, our reputation may be seriously harmed. Our advertisers and partners may also be less willing to allocate their budgets or resources to Snapchat, which could seriously harm our business. In addition, we calculate average DAUs for a particular quarter by adding the number of DAUs on each day of that quarter and dividing that sum by the number of days in that quarter. This calculation may mask any individual days or months within the quarter that are significantly higher or lower than the quarterly average.

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Mobile malware, viruses, hacking and phishing attacks, spamming, and improper or illegal use of Snapchat could seriously harm our business and reputation.

Mobile malware, viruses, hacking, and phishing attacks have become more prevalent and sophisticated in our industry, have occurred on our systems in the past, and may occur on our systems in the future. Because of our prominence, we believe that we are an attractive target for these sorts of attacks. Although it is difficult to determine what, if any, harm may directly result from an interruption or attack, any failure to detect such attack and maintain performance, reliability, security, and availability of our products and technical infrastructure to the satisfaction of our users may seriously harm our reputation and our ability to retain existing users and attract new users.

In addition, spammers attempt to use our products to send targeted and untargeted spam messages to users, which may embarrass or annoy users and make our products less user friendly. We cannot be certain that the technologies that we have developed to repel spamming attacks will be able to eliminate all spam messages from our products. Our actions to combat spam may also require diversion of significant time and focus from improving our products. As a result of spamming activities, our users may use our products less or stop using them altogether, and result in continuing operational cost to us.

Similarly, terror and other criminal groups may use our products to promote their goals and encourage users to engage in terror and other illegal activities. We expect that as more people use our products, these groups will increasingly seek to misuse our products. Although we invest resources to combat these activities, including by suspending or terminating accounts we believe are violating our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines, we expect these groups will continue to seek ways to act inappropriately and illegally on Snapchat. Combating these groups requires our teams to divert significant time and focus from improving our products. In addition, we may not be able to control or stop Snapchat from becoming the preferred application of use by these groups, which may become public knowledge and seriously harm our reputation or lead to lawsuits or attention from regulators. If these activities increase on Snapchat, our reputation, user growth and user engagement, and operational cost structure could be seriously harmed.

Because we store, process, and use data, some of which contains personal information, we are subject to complex and evolving federal, state, and foreign laws and regulations regarding privacy, data protection, content, and other matters. Many of these laws and regulations are subject to change and uncertain interpretation, and could result in investigations, claims, changes to our business practices, increased cost of operations, and declines in user growth, retention, or engagement, any of which could seriously harm our business.

We are subject to a variety of laws and regulations in the United States and other countries that involve matters central to our business, including user privacy, security, rights of publicity, data protection, content, intellectual property, distribution, electronic contracts and other communications, competition, protection of minors, consumer protection, taxation, and online-payment services. These laws can be particularly restrictive in countries outside the United States. Both in the United States and abroad, these laws and regulations constantly evolve and remain subject to significant change. In addition, the application and interpretation of these laws and regulations are often uncertain, particularly in the new and rapidly evolving industry in which we operate. Because we store, process, and use data, some of which contains personal information, we are subject to complex and evolving federal, state, and foreign laws and regulations regarding privacy, data protection, content, and other matters. Many of these laws and regulations are subject to change and uncertain interpretation, and could result in investigations, claims, changes to our business practices, increased cost of operations, and declines in user growth, retention, or engagement, any of which could seriously harm our business.

Several proposals have recently been adopted or are currently pending before, and we believe a number of investigations into other technology companies are currently being conducted by, federal, state, and foreign legislative and regulatory bodies that could significantly affect our business. GDPR in the European Union, which went into effect in May 2018, placed new data protection obligations and restrictions on organizations and may require us to further change our policies and procedures. If we are not compliant with GDPR requirements, we may be subject to significant fines and our business may be seriously harmed. In addition, the California Consumer Privacy Act went into effect in January 2020 and places additional requirements on the handling of personal data. The CCPA also provides for civil penalties for violations, as well as a private right of action for data breaches, which may increase the likelihood and cost of data breach litigation. The potential effects of this legislation are far-reaching and may require us, our partners, and advertisers to modify data processing practices and policies and to incur substantial costs and expenses in an effort to comply. We expect other state and federal legislative and regulatory bodies may enact similar legislation regarding the handling of personal data, or conduct additional investigations into specific companies or the industry as a whole that could alter the existing regulatory environment in a manner that would be adverse to us. Furthermore, in December 2018, the Australian government passed the Assistance and Access Bill 2018 that provides Australian law enforcement authorities with mechanisms to make requests for

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electronic communication, even if the data is end-to-end encrypted like in Snapchat, which may create new obligations for companies providing communication services and make their data less secure.

Our financial condition and results of operations will fluctuate from quarter to quarter, which makes them difficult to predict.

Our quarterly results of operations have fluctuated in the past and will fluctuate in the future. Additionally, we have a limited operating history with the current scale of our business, which makes it difficult to forecast our future results. As a result, you should not rely on our past quarterly results of operations as indicators of future performance. You should take into account the risks and uncertainties frequently encountered by companies in rapidly evolving market segments. Our financial condition and results of operations in any given quarter can be influenced by numerous factors, many of which we are unable to predict or are outside of our control, including:

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If we are unable to successfully grow our user base and further monetize our products, our business will suffer.

We have made, and are continuing to make, investments to enable users, partners, and advertisers to create compelling content and deliver advertising to our users. Existing and prospective Snapchat users and advertisers may not be successful in creating content that leads to and maintains user engagement. We are continuously seeking to balance the objectives of our users and advertisers with our desire to provide an optimal user experience. We do not seek to monetize all of our products nor do we focus our efforts on users with higher ARPU, and we may not be successful in achieving a balance that continues to attract and retain users and advertisers. If we are not successful in our efforts to grow or effectively monetize our user base, or if we are unable to build and maintain good relations with our advertisers, our user growth and user engagement and our business may be seriously harmed. In addition, we may expend significant resources to launch new products that we are unable to monetize, which may seriously harm our business.

Additionally, we may not succeed in further monetizing Snapchat. We currently monetize Snapchat by displaying in the application advertisements that we sell and advertisements sold by our partners. As a result, our financial performance and ability to grow revenue could be seriously harmed if:

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We cannot assure you that we will effectively manage our growth.

The growth and expansion of our business, headcount, and products create significant challenges for our management, including managing multiple relationships with users, advertisers, partners, and other third parties, and constrain operational and financial resources. If our operations or the number of third-party relationships continues to grow, our information-technology systems and our internal controls and procedures may not adequately support our operations. In addition, some members of our management do not have significant experience managing large global business operations, so our management may not be able to manage such growth effectively. To effectively manage our growth, we must continue to improve our operational, financial, and management processes and systems and effectively expand, train, and manage our employee base. As part of that effort, we recently reorganized the structure and operations of our ad sales team. Although we believe the reorganization will improve the efficiency of our sales team and result in better service for our advertisers over the long term, the reorganization may not have the intended effect and we may experience disruptions, employee turnover, and declines in revenue while our sales team and advertisers become accustomed to the new operations.

As our organization continues to mature and we are required to implement more complex organizational management structures, we may also find it increasingly difficult to maintain the benefits of our corporate culture, including our ability to quickly develop and launch new and innovative products. This could negatively affect our business performance and seriously harm our business.

Our costs may increase faster than our revenue, which could seriously harm our business or increase our losses.

Providing our products to our users is costly, and we expect our expenses, including those related to people and hosting, to grow in the future. This expense growth will continue as we broaden our user base, as users increase the number of connections and amount of content they consume and share, as we develop and implement new product features that require more computing infrastructure, and as we grow our business. Historically, our costs have increased each year due to these factors, and we expect to continue to incur increasing costs. Our costs are based on development and release of new products and the addition of users and may not be offset by a corresponding growth in our revenue. We will continue to invest in our global infrastructure to provide our products quickly and reliably to all users around the world, including in countries where we do not expect significant short-term monetization, if any. Our expenses may be greater than we anticipate, and our investments to make our business and our technical infrastructure more efficient may not succeed and may outpace monetization efforts. In addition, we expect to increase marketing, sales, and other operating expenses to grow and expand our operations and to remain competitive. Increases in our costs without a corresponding increase in our revenue would increase our losses and could seriously harm our business and financial performance.

Our business depends on our ability to maintain and scale our technology infrastructure. Any significant disruption to our service could damage our reputation, result in a potential loss of users and decrease in user engagement, and seriously harm our business.

Our reputation and ability to attract, retain, and serve users depends on the reliable performance of Snapchat and our underlying technology infrastructure. We have in the past experienced, and may in the future experience, interruptions in the availability or performance of our products and services from time to time. Our systems may not be adequately designed with the necessary reliability and redundancy to avoid performance delays or outages that could seriously harm our business. If Snapchat is unavailable when users attempt to access it, or if it does not load as quickly as they expect, users may not return to Snapchat as often in the future, or at all. As our user base and the volume and types of information shared on Snapchat grow, we will need an increasing amount of technology infrastructure, including network capacity and computing power, to continue to satisfy our users’ needs. It is possible that we may fail to effectively scale and grow our technology infrastructure to accommodate these increased demands. In addition, our business is subject to interruptions, delays, and failures resulting from earthquakes, other natural disasters, terrorism, and other catastrophic events.

Substantially all of our network infrastructure is provided by third parties, including Google Cloud and Amazon Web Services. Any disruption or failure in the services we receive from these providers could harm our ability to handle existing or increased traffic and could seriously harm our business. Any financial or other difficulties these providers face may seriously harm our business. And because we exercise little control over these providers, we are vulnerable to problems with the services they provide.

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Our business emphasizes rapid innovation and prioritizes long-term user engagement over short-term financial condition or results of operations. That strategy may yield results that sometimes don’t align with the market’s expectations. If that happens, our stock price may be negatively affected.

Our business is growing and becoming more complex, and our success depends on our ability to quickly develop and launch new and innovative products. We believe our culture fosters this goal. Our focus on innovations and quick reactions could result in unintended outcomes or decisions that are poorly received by our users, advertisers, or partners. We have made, and expect to continue to make, significant investments to develop and launch new products and services and we cannot assure you that users will purchase or use such new products and services in the future. We will also continue to find effective ways to show our community new and existing products and alert them to events, holidays, relevant content, and meaningful opportunities to connect with their friends. These methods may provide temporary increases in engagement that may ultimately fail to attract and retain users. Our culture also prioritizes our long-term user engagement over short-term financial condition or results of operations. We frequently make decisions that may reduce our short-term revenue or profitability if we believe that the decisions benefit the aggregate user experience and will thereby improve our financial performance over the long term. For example, we monitor how advertising on Snapchat affects our users’ experiences to ensure we do not deliver too many advertisements to our users, and we may decide to decrease the number of advertisements to ensure our users’ satisfaction in the product. In addition, we improve Snapchat based on feedback provided by our users, advertisers, and partners. These decisions may not produce the long-term benefits that we expect, in which case our user growth and engagement, our relationships with advertisers and partners, and our business could be seriously harmed.

If we are unable to protect our intellectual property, the value of our brand and other intangible assets may be diminished, and our business may be seriously harmed. If we need to license or acquire new intellectual property, we may incur substantial costs.

We aim to protect our confidential proprietary information, in part, by entering into confidentiality agreements and invention assignment agreements with all our employees, consultants, advisors, and any third parties who access or contribute to our proprietary know-how, information, or technology. We also rely on trademark, copyright, patent, trade secret, and domain-name-protection laws to protect our proprietary rights. In the United States and internationally, we have filed various applications to protect aspects of our intellectual property, and we currently hold a number of issued patents in multiple jurisdictions. In the future, we may acquire additional patents or patent portfolios, which could require significant cash expenditures. However, third parties may knowingly or unknowingly infringe our proprietary rights, third parties may challenge proprietary rights held by us, and pending and future trademark and patent applications may not be approved. In addition, effective intellectual property protection may not be available in every country in which we operate or intend to operate our business. In any of these cases, we may be required to expend significant time and expense to prevent infringement or to enforce our rights. Although we have taken measures to protect our proprietary rights, there can be no assurance that others will not offer products or concepts that are substantially similar to ours and compete with our business. If we are unable to protect our proprietary rights or prevent unauthorized use or appropriation by third parties, the value of our brand and other intangible assets may be diminished, and competitors may be able to more effectively mimic our service and methods of operations. Any of these events could seriously harm our business.

In addition, we have contributed software source code under open-source licenses, have made other technology we developed available under other open licenses, and include open-source software in our products. From time to time, we may face claims from third parties claiming ownership of, or demanding release of, the open-source software or derivative works that we have developed using such software, which could include our proprietary source code, or otherwise seeking to enforce the terms of the applicable open-source license. These claims could result in litigation and could require us to make our software source code freely available, seek licenses from third parties to continue offering our products for certain uses, or cease offering the products associated with such software unless and until we can re-engineer them to avoid infringement, which may be very costly.

If our users do not continue to contribute content or their contributions are not perceived as valuable to other users, we may experience a decline in user growth, retention, and engagement on Snapchat, which could result in the loss of advertisers and revenue.

Our success depends on our ability to provide Snapchat users with engaging content, which in part depends on the content contributed by our users. If users, including influential users such as world leaders, government officials, celebrities, athletes, journalists, sports teams, media outlets, and brands, do not continue to contribute engaging content to Snapchat, our user growth, retention, and engagement may decline. That, in turn, may impair our ability to maintain good relationships with our advertisers or attract new advertisers, which may seriously harm our business.

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Foreign government initiatives and restrictions could seriously harm our business.

Foreign data protection, privacy, consumer protection, content regulation, and other laws and regulations are often more restrictive than those in the United States. Foreign governments may censor Snapchat in their countries, restrict access to Snapchat from their countries entirely, impose other restrictions that may affect their citizens’ ability to access Snapchat for an extended period of time or even indefinitely, require data localization, or impose other laws or regulations that we cannot comply with, would be difficult for us to comply with, or would require us to rebuild our products or the infrastructure for our products. Any restriction on access to Snapchat due to foreign government actions or initiatives, or any withdrawal by us from certain countries because of such actions or initiatives, would adversely affect our DAUs, including by giving our competitors an opportunity to penetrate geographic markets that we cannot access. As a result, our user growth, retention, and engagement may be seriously harmed, and we may not be able to maintain or grow our revenue as anticipated and our business could be seriously harmed.

Our users may increasingly engage directly with our partners and advertisers instead of through Snapchat, which may negatively affect our revenue and seriously harm our business.

Using our products, some partners and advertisers not only can interact directly with our users but can also direct our users to content with third-party websites and products and downloads of third-party applications. The more our users engage with third-party websites and applications, the less engagement we may get from them, which would adversely affect the revenue we could earn from them. Although we believe that Snapchat reaps significant long-term benefits from increased user engagement on content on Snapchat provided by our partners, these benefits may not offset the possible loss of advertising revenue, in which case our business could be seriously harmed.

If events occur that damage our brand or reputation, our business may be seriously harmed.

We have developed a brand that we believe has contributed to our success. We also believe that maintaining and enhancing our brand is critical to expanding our user base, advertisers, and partners. Because many of our users join Snapchat on the invitation or recommendation of a friend or family member, one of our primary focuses is on ensuring that our users continue to view Snapchat and our brand favorably so that these referrals continue. Maintaining and enhancing our brand will depend largely on our ability to continue to provide useful, novel, fun, reliable, trustworthy, and innovative products, which we may not do successfully. We may introduce new products, make changes to existing products and services, or require our users to agree to new terms of service related to new and existing products that users do not like, which may negatively affect our brand in the short term, long term, or both. Additionally, our partners’ actions may affect our brand if users do not appreciate what those partners do on Snapchat. We may also fail to adequately support the needs of our users, advertisers, or partners, which could erode confidence in our brand. Maintaining and enhancing our brand may require us to make substantial investments and these investments may not be successful. If we fail to successfully promote and maintain our brand or if we incur excessive expenses in this effort, our business may be seriously harmed.

We and our founders also receive a high degree of media coverage globally. In the past, we have experienced, and we expect that we will continue to experience, media, legislative, and regulatory scrutiny. Unfavorable publicity regarding us, our privacy practices, product changes, product quality, litigation, or regulatory activity, or regarding the actions of our partners, our users, or other companies in our industry, could seriously harm our reputation and brand. Negative publicity and scrutiny could also adversely affect the size, demographics, engagement, and loyalty of our user base and result in decreased revenue, fewer app installs (or increased app un-installs), or declining user growth rates, any of which could seriously harm our business.

Expanding and operating in international markets requires significant resources and management attention. If we are not successful in expanding and operating our business in international markets, we may incur significant costs, damage our brand, or need to lay off employees in those markets, any of which may seriously harm our business.

We have expanded to new international markets, which may have very different cultures and commercial, legal, and regulatory systems than where we predominately operate. In connection with our international expansion, we have also hired new employees in many of these markets. This international expansion may:

These issues may eventually lead to layoffs of employees in these markets and may harm our ability to grow our business in these markets. In addition, scaling our business to international markets imposes complexity on our business, and

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requires additional financial and management resources. We may not be able to manage growth and expansion effectively, which could damage our brand, result in significant costs, and seriously harm our business.

Operating our business requires a significant amount of cash, and we may not have sufficient cash flow from our business to pay our Convertible Notes, and any other debt when due, which may seriously harm our business.

Our ability to make principal or interest payments, or to refinance, the Convertible Notes or other indebtedness depends on our future performance, which is subject to many factors beyond our control. Our business may not generate sufficient cash flow from operations in the future to service our debt and business. If we are unable to generate such cash flow, we may be required to adopt one or more alternatives, such as selling assets, restructuring debt, obtaining additional debt financing, or issuing additional equity securities, any of which may be on terms that are not favorable to us or, in the case of equity securities, highly dilutive to our stockholders. Our ability to refinance the Convertible Notes or our other indebtedness will depend on various factors, including the available capital markets, our business, and our financial condition at such time. We may not be able to engage in any of these activities or on desirable terms, which could result in a default on our debt obligations. In addition, our existing and future debt agreements, including our Convertible Notes and Credit Facility, may contain restrictive covenants that may prohibit us from adopting any of these alternatives. Our failure to comply with these covenants could result in an event of default which, if not cured or waived, could result in the acceleration of our debt, and would seriously harm our business.

In addition, holders of the Convertible Notes will have the right to require us to repurchase all or a portion of the Convertible Notes on the occurrence of a fundamental change at a repurchase price equal to 100% of the principal amount of the Convertible Notes to be repurchased, plus accrued and unpaid interest, if any, to, but excluding, the fundamental change repurchase date. Further, if a make-whole fundamental change as defined in the Indenture governing the Convertible Notes occurs prior to the maturity date of the Convertible Notes, we will in some cases be required to increase the conversion rate for a holder that elects to convert its Convertible Notes in connection with such make-whole fundamental change. On the conversion of the Convertible Notes, unless we elect to deliver solely shares of our Class A common stock to settle such conversion (other than paying cash in lieu of delivering any fractional share), we will be required to make cash payments for the Convertible Notes being converted. However, we may not have enough available cash or be able to obtain financing at the time we are required to make such repurchases of the Convertible Notes surrendered or pay cash with respect to the Convertible Notes being converted.

We have spent and may continue to spend substantial funds in connection with the tax liabilities on the settlement of equity awards. The manner in which we fund these tax liabilities may cause us to spend substantial funds or dilute stockholders, either of which may have an adverse effect on our financial condition.

When our employee equity awards vest, we must withhold taxes and remit them to relevant taxing authorities on behalf of employees. To fund the withholding and remittance obligations for equity awards, we have either used our existing cash or sold a portion of vested equity awards on behalf of our employees near the applicable settlement dates in an amount that is substantially equivalent to the number of shares of common stock that we would withhold in connection with these settlements. In the future, we may also sell equity on our behalf and use the proceeds to fund the withholding and remittance obligations for equity awards. Any of these methods may have an adverse effect on our financial condition.

If we sell shares on behalf of our employees, although those newly issued shares should not be dilutive, such sales to the market could result in a decline to our stock price. If we use our existing cash, or if our cash reserves are not sufficient, we may choose to issue equity securities or borrow funds under our revolving credit facility. In such an event, we cannot assure you that we will be able to successfully match the proceeds of any such equity financing to the then applicable tax liability, and any such equity financing could result in a decline in our stock price and be dilutive to existing stockholders. If we elect to satisfy tax withholding and remittance obligations in whole or in part by drawing on our revolving credit facility, our interest expense and principal repayment requirements could increase significantly, which could seriously harm our business.

Our products are highly technical and may contain undetected software bugs or hardware errors, which could manifest in ways that could seriously harm our reputation and our business.

Our products are highly technical and complex. Snapchat, or any other products we may introduce in the future, may contain undetected software bugs, hardware errors, and other vulnerabilities. These bugs and errors can manifest in any number of ways in our products, including through diminished performance, security vulnerabilities, malfunctions, or even permanently disabled products. We have a practice of rapidly updating our products and some errors in our products may be discovered only after a product has been released or shipped and used by users, and may in some cases be detected only under certain circumstances or after extended use. Spectacles, as an eyewear product, is regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug

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Administration, or the FDA, and may malfunction in a way that physically harms a user. We offer a limited one-year warranty in the United States and a limited two-year warranty in Europe, and any such defects discovered in our products after commercial release could result in a loss of sales and users, which could seriously harm our business. Any errors, bugs, or vulnerabilities discovered in our code after release could damage our reputation, drive away users, lower revenue, and expose us to damages claims, any of which could seriously harm our business.

We could also face claims for product liability, tort, or breach of warranty. In addition, our product contracts with users contain provisions relating to warranty disclaimers and liability limitations, which may not be upheld. Defending a lawsuit, regardless of its merit, is costly and may divert management’s attention and seriously harm our reputation and our business. In addition, if our liability insurance coverage proves inadequate or future coverage is unavailable on acceptable terms or at all, our business could be seriously harmed.

We have been and may be subject to regulatory investigations and proceedings in the future, which could cause us to incur substantial costs or require us to change our business practices in a way that could seriously harm our business.

We have been and may in the future be subject to investigations and inquiries from government entities. These investigations and inquiries, and our compliance with any associated regulatory orders or consent decrees, may require us to change our policies or practices, subject us to monetary fines or other penalties or sanctions, divert management’s attention, and require us to incur significant legal and other expenses, any of which could seriously harm our business. For example, in the past, we responded to subpoenas and requests for information made by staff from the U.S. Department of Justice, or DOJ, and the SEC. We believe that these regulators were investigating issues related to allegations asserted in our federal securities class actions about our IPO disclosures. In September 2019, both the DOJ and SEC provided us with written confirmations that they are no longer pursuing their investigations of these matters.

We are currently, and expect to be in the future, party to patent lawsuits and other intellectual property claims that are expensive and time-consuming. If resolved adversely, these lawsuits and claims could seriously harm our business.

Companies in the mobile, camera, communication, media, internet, and other technology-related industries own large numbers of patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, and other intellectual property rights, and frequently enter into litigation based on allegations of infringement, misappropriation, or other violations of intellectual property or other rights. In addition, various “non-practicing entities” that own patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, and other intellectual property rights often attempt to aggressively assert their rights to extract value from technology companies. Furthermore, from time to time we may introduce new products or make other business changes, including in areas where we currently do not compete, which could increase our exposure to patent, copyright, trademark, trade secret, and other intellectual property rights claims from competitors and non-practicing entities. We have been subject to, and expect to continue to be subject to, claims and legal proceedings from holders of patents, trademarks, copyrights, and other intellectual property rights alleging that some of our products or content infringe their rights. For example, in January 2017, Vaporstream, Inc. filed a complaint against us in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. The complaint, which seeks injunctive relief among other remedies, alleges that certain Snapchat features infringe several Vaporstream patents. A trial date relating to these claims has been scheduled for early 2020. In addition, in April 2018, Blackberry Limited filed a lawsuit against us alleging that we infringe six of its patents. This lawsuit was recently dismissed after four of the patents were ruled to be invalid; however, Blackberry Limited has since appealed the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Likewise, in January 2020, You Map, Inc. filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware against us, our subsidiary Zenly, and certain of our respective employees alleging that we misappropriated various trade secrets regarding map technology used in Snapchat’s and Zenly’s map products. While we believe we have meritorious defenses to these claims, an unfavorable outcome in these lawsuits could seriously harm our business. If these or other matters continue in the future or we need to enter into licensing arrangements, which may not be available to us or on terms favorable to us, it may increase our costs and decrease the value of our products, and our business could be seriously harmed.

We rely on a variety of statutory and common-law frameworks for the content we provide our users, including the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Communications Decency Act, or CDA, and the fair-use doctrine. However, each of these statutes and doctrines is subject to uncertain judicial interpretation and regulatory and legislative amendments. For example, Congress amended the CDA in 2018 in ways that could expose some Internet platforms to an increased risk of litigation, and members of Congress proposed further amendments in 2019. Moreover, some of these statutes and doctrines provide protection only or primarily in the United States. If the rules around these doctrines change, if international jurisdictions refuse to apply similar protections, or if a court were to disagree with our application of those rules to our service, we could incur liability and our business could be seriously harmed.

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From time to time, we are involved in class-action lawsuits and other litigation matters that are expensive and time-consuming and could seriously harm our business.

We are involved in numerous lawsuits, including putative class-action lawsuits brought by users and investors, some of which may claim statutory damages. We anticipate that we will continue to be a target for lawsuits in the future. Because we have millions of users, class-action lawsuits against us that are purportedly filed by or on behalf of users typically claim enormous monetary damages in the aggregate even if the alleged per-user harm is small or non-existent. Similarly, because we have a large number of stockholders, class-action lawsuits on securities theories typically claim enormous monetary damages in the aggregate even if the alleged loss per stockholder is small. Any litigation to which we are a party may result in an onerous or unfavorable judgment that might not be reversed on appeal, or we may decide to settle lawsuits on adverse terms. Any such negative outcome could result in payments of substantial monetary damages or fines, or changes to our products or business practices, and seriously harm our business. Even if the outcome of any such litigation or claim is favorable, defending them is costly and can impose a significant burden on management and employees. We may also receive unfavorable preliminary, interim, or final rulings in the course of litigation. For example, beginning on May 16, 2017, we, certain of our officers and directors, and the underwriters of our IPO were named as defendants in securities class actions in federal and state courts purportedly brought on behalf of purchasers of our Class A common stock. In January 2020, we entered into a preliminary agreement to settle the federal and state securities class actions.

We may face lawsuits or incur liability based on information posted to Snapchat.

We have faced, currently face, and will continue to face claims relating to information that is published or made available on Snapchat. In particular, the nature of our business exposes us to claims related to defamation, intellectual property rights, rights of publicity and privacy, and personal injury torts. For example, we do not monitor or edit the vast majority of content that is communicated through Snapchat, and such content may expose us to lawsuits. This risk is enhanced in certain jurisdictions outside the United States where our protection from liability for third-party actions may be unclear or evolving and where we may be less protected under local laws than we are in the United States. In addition, there have been various Congressional efforts to restrict the scope of the protections available to online platforms under Section 230 of the CDA, including an amendment in 2018 and more recent proposed amendments, which could decrease or change our protections from liability for third-party content in the United States. We could incur significant costs investigating and defending such claims and, if we are found liable, significant damages. We could also face fines or orders restricting or blocking our services in particular geographies as a result of content hosted on our services. For example, legislation in Germany may impose significant fines for failure to comply with certain content removal and disclosure obligations. If any of these events occur, our business could be seriously harmed.

We plan to continue expanding our international operations where we have limited operating experience and may be subject to increased business and economic risks that could seriously harm our business.

We plan to continue expanding our business operations abroad and translating our products into other languages. Snapchat is currently available in more than 30 languages, and we have offices in more than 15 countries. We plan to enter new international markets where we have limited or no experience in marketing, selling, and deploying our products and advertisements. Our limited experience and infrastructure in such markets, or the lack of a critical mass of users in such markets, may make it more difficult for us to effectively monetize any increase in DAUs in those markets, and may increase our costs without a corresponding increase in revenue. If we fail to deploy or manage our operations in international markets successfully, our business may suffer. In the future, as our international operations increase, or more of our expenses are denominated in currencies other than the U.S. dollar, our operating results may be more greatly affected by fluctuations in the exchange rates of the currencies in which we do business. In addition, as our international operations and sales continue to grow, we are subject to a variety of risks inherent in doing business internationally, including:

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If we are unable to expand internationally and manage the complexity of our global operations successfully, our business could be seriously harmed.

New legislation that would change U.S. or foreign taxation of business activities, including the imposition of tax based on gross revenue, could seriously harm our business.

Reforming the taxation of international businesses has been a priority for politicians, and a wide variety of changes have been proposed or enacted. Due to the large and expanding scale of our international business activities, any changes in the taxation of such activities may increase our tax expense, the amount of taxes we pay, or both, and seriously harm our business. For example, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, or the Tax Act, was enacted in December 2017 and significantly reformed the U.S. Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the Code. The Tax Act lowered U.S. federal corporate income tax rates, changed the utilization of future net operating loss carryforwards, allowed for the expensing of certain capital expenditures, and put into effect sweeping changes to U.S. taxation of international business activities.

In addition, many jurisdictions and intergovernmental organizations have been discussing proposals that may change various aspects of the existing framework under which our tax obligations are determined in many of the countries in which we do business. Some jurisdictions have enacted, and others have proposed, taxes based on gross receipts applicable to digital services regardless of profitability. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development has been working on a proposal that may change how taxable presence for digital services is defined and result in the imposition of taxes based on net income in countries where we have no physical presence.

We continue to examine the impact these and other tax reforms may have on our business. The impact of these and other tax reforms is uncertain and one or more of these or similar measures could seriously harm our business.

Exposure to United Kingdom political developments, including the effect of its withdrawal from the European Union, could be costly and difficult to comply with and could seriously harm our business.

In June 2016, a referendum was passed in the United Kingdom to leave the European Union, commonly referred to as “Brexit.” This decision created an uncertain political and economic environment in the United Kingdom and other European Union countries, and the formal process for leaving the European Union has taken years to complete. The United Kingdom formally left the European Union on January 31, 2020, and is now in a transition period through December 31, 2020. We have licensed a portion of our intellectual property to one of our United Kingdom subsidiaries and have based a significant portion of our non-U.S. operations in the United Kingdom. Although the United Kingdom will remain in the European Union single market and customs union during the transition period, the long-term nature of the United Kingdom’s relationship with the European Union is unclear and there is considerable uncertainty as to when any agreement will be reached and implemented. The political and economic instability created by Brexit has caused and may continue to cause significant volatility in global financial markets and uncertainty regarding the regulation of data protection in the United Kingdom. In particular, although the United Kingdom enacted a Data Protection Act in May 2018 that is consistent with the EU General Data Protection Regulation, uncertainty remains regarding how data transfers to and from the United Kingdom will be regulated. Brexit could also have the effect of disrupting the free movement of goods, services, capital, and people between the United Kingdom, the European Union, and elsewhere. The full effect of Brexit is uncertain and depends on any agreements the United Kingdom may make with the European Union and others. Consequently, no assurance can be given

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about the impact of the outcome and our business, including operational and tax policies, may be seriously harmed or require reassessment.

We plan to continue to make acquisitions and investments in other companies, which could require significant management attention, disrupt our business, dilute our stockholders, and seriously harm our business.

As part of our business strategy, we have made and intend to make acquisitions to add specialized employees and complementary companies, products, and technologies, as well as investments in other companies in furtherance of our strategic objectives. Our ability to acquire and successfully integrate larger or more complex companies, products, and technologies is unproven. In the future, we may not be able to find other suitable acquisition or investment candidates, and we may not be able to complete acquisitions or investments on favorable terms, if at all. Our previous and future acquisitions and investments may not achieve our goals, and any future acquisitions or investments we complete could be viewed negatively by users, advertisers, partners, or investors. In addition, if we fail to successfully close transactions or integrate new teams, or integrate the products and technologies associated with these acquisitions into our company, our business could be seriously harmed. Any integration process may require significant time and resources, and we may not be able to manage the process successfully. We may not successfully evaluate or use the acquired products, technology, and personnel, or accurately forecast the financial impact of an acquisition or investment transaction, including accounting charges. We may also incur unanticipated liabilities that we assume as a result of acquiring companies. We may have to pay cash, incur debt, or issue equity securities to pay for any acquisition or investment, any of which could seriously harm our business. Selling equity to finance any such acquisition or investment would also dilute our stockholders. Incurring debt would increase our fixed obligations and could also include covenants or other restrictions that would impede our ability to manage our operations.

In addition, it generally takes several months after the closing of an acquisition to finalize the purchase price allocation. Therefore, it is possible that our valuation of an acquisition may change and result in unanticipated write-offs or charges, impairment of our goodwill, or a material change to the fair value of the assets and liabilities associated with a particular acquisition, any of which could seriously harm our business.

Our acquisition and investment strategy may not succeed if we are unable to remain attractive to target companies or expeditiously close transactions. Issuing shares of Class A common stock to fund an acquisition or investment would cause economic dilution to existing stockholders but not voting dilution. If we develop a reputation for being a difficult acquirer or having an unfavorable work environment, or target companies view our non-voting Class A common stock unfavorably, we may be unable to consummate key acquisition transactions essential to our corporate strategy and our business may be seriously harmed.

As our business expands, we have offered and may continue to offer credit to our partners to stay competitive, and as a result we may be exposed to credit risk of some of our partners, which may seriously harm our business.

As our business continues to grow and expand, we may decide to engage in business with some of our partners on an open credit basis. While we may monitor individual partner payment capability when we grant open credit arrangements and maintain allowances we believe are adequate to cover exposure for doubtful accounts, we cannot assure investors these programs will be effective in managing our credit risks in the future, especially as our business expands, engage with partners that have limited operating history, or engage with partners that we may not be familiar with. If we are unable to adequately control these risks, our business could be seriously harmed.

If we default on our credit obligations, our operations may be interrupted and our business could be seriously harmed.

We have a Credit Facility that we may draw on to finance our operations, acquisitions, and other corporate purposes, such as funding our tax-withholding and remittance obligations in connection with settling equity awards. If we default on these credit obligations, our lenders may:

If any of these events occur, our operations may be interrupted and our ability to fund our operations or obligations, as well as our business, could be seriously harmed. In addition, our Credit Facility contains operating covenants, including customary limitations on the incurrence of certain indebtedness and liens, restrictions on certain intercompany transactions, and limitations on the amount of dividends and stock repurchases. Our ability to comply with these covenants may be affected by events beyond our control, and breaches of these covenants could result in a default under the Credit Facility and any future financial agreements into which we may enter. If not waived, defaults could cause our outstanding indebtedness under our Credit Facility and any future financing agreements that we may enter into to become immediately due and

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payable. For more information on our Credit Facility, see “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Liquidity and Capital Resources.”

We may have exposure to greater-than-anticipated tax liabilities, which could seriously harm our business.

Our income tax obligations are based on our corporate operating structure and third-party and intercompany arrangements, including the manner in which we develop, value, and use our intellectual property and the valuations of our intercompany transactions. The tax laws applicable to our international business activities, including the laws of the United States and other jurisdictions, are subject to change and uncertain interpretation. The taxing authorities of the jurisdictions in which we operate may challenge our methodologies for valuing developed technology, intercompany arrangements, or transfer pricing, which could increase our worldwide effective tax rate and the amount of taxes we pay and seriously harm our business. Taxing authorities may also determine that the manner in which we operate our business is not consistent with how we report our income, which could increase our effective tax rate and the amount of taxes we pay and seriously harm our business. In addition, our future income taxes could fluctuate because of earnings being lower than anticipated in jurisdictions that have lower statutory tax rates and higher than anticipated in jurisdictions that have higher statutory tax rates, by changes in the valuation of our deferred tax assets and liabilities, or by changes in tax laws, regulations, or accounting principles. We are subject to regular review and audit by U.S. federal and state and foreign tax authorities. Any adverse outcome from a review or audit could seriously harm our business. In addition, determining our worldwide provision for income taxes and other tax liabilities requires significant judgment by management, and there are many transactions where the ultimate tax determination is uncertain. Although we believe that our estimates are reasonable, the ultimate tax outcome may differ from the amounts recorded in our financial statements for such period or periods and may seriously harm our business.

Our ability to use our net operating loss carryforwards and certain other tax attributes may be limited, each of which could seriously harm our business.

As of December 31, 2019, we had U.S. federal net operating loss carryforwards of approximately $4.0 billion and state net operating loss carryforwards of approximately $2.3 billion, as well as U.K. net operating loss carryforwards of approximately $1.3 billion. We also accumulated U.S. federal and state research tax credits of $225.2 million and $135.8 million, respectively, as of December 31, 2019. Under Sections 382 and 383 of the Code, if a corporation undergoes an “ownership change,” the corporation’s ability to use its pre-change net operating loss carryforwards and other pre-change tax attributes, such as research tax credits, to offset its post-change income and taxes may be limited. In general, an “ownership change” occurs if there is a cumulative change in our ownership by “5% shareholders” that exceeds 50 percentage points over a rolling three-year period. Similar rules may apply under state tax laws. In the event that we experience one or more ownership changes as a result of future transactions in our stock, then we may be limited in our ability to use our net operating loss carryforwards and other tax assets to reduce taxes owed on the net taxable income that we earn.

Additionally, for net operating loss carryforwards arising in tax years beginning after December 31, 2017, the Tax Act limits a taxpayer’s ability to utilize such carryforwards to 80% of taxable income. In addition, net operating loss carryforwards arising in tax years ending after December 31, 2017 can be carried forward indefinitely, but carryback is generally prohibited. Net operating loss carryforwards generated by us before January 1, 2018 will not be subject to the taxable income limitation and will continue to have a twenty-year carryforward period. However, the changes in the carryforward and carryback periods as well as the new limitation on use of net operating losses may significantly impact our ability to use net operating loss carryforwards generated after December 31, 2017, as well as the timing of any such use, and could seriously harm our business. In the U.K., net operating loss carryforwards can be carried forward indefinitely, however, use of such carryforwards in a given year is generally limited to 50% of such year’s taxable income and may be subject to ownership change rules that restrict the use of net operating loss carryforwards.

Any limitations on the ability to use our net operating loss carryforwards and other tax assets could seriously harm our business.

If our goodwill or intangible assets become impaired, we may be required to record a significant charge to earnings, which could seriously harm our business.

Under U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, or GAAP, we review our intangible assets for impairment when events or changes in circumstances indicate the carrying value may not be recoverable. Goodwill is required to be tested for impairment at least annually. As of December 31, 2019, we had recorded a total of $853.3 million of goodwill and intangible assets, net related to our acquisitions. An adverse change in market conditions, particularly if such change has the effect of changing one of our critical assumptions or estimates, could result in a change to the estimation of fair value that could result in an impairment charge to our goodwill or intangible assets. Any such material charges may seriously harm our business.

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We cannot be certain that additional financing will be available on reasonable terms when needed, or at all, which could seriously harm our business.

We have incurred net losses and negative cash flow from operations for all prior periods, and we may not achieve or maintain profitability. As a result, we may need additional financing. Our ability to obtain additional financing, if and when required, will depend on investor demand, our operating performance, our credit rating, the condition of the capital markets, and other factors. To the extent we use available funds or draw on our Credit Facility, we may need to raise additional funds and we cannot assure investors that additional financing will be available to us on favorable terms when required, or at all. If we raise additional funds through the issuance of equity, equity-linked, or debt securities, those securities may have rights, preferences, or privileges senior to the rights of our Class A common stock, and our existing stockholders may experience dilution. In the event that we are unable to obtain additional financing on favorable terms, our interest expense and principal repayment requirements could increase significantly, which could seriously harm our business.

We do not have manufacturing capabilities and depend on contract manufacturers. If we encounter problems with our contract manufacturers or if the manufacturing process stops or is delayed for any reason, we may not deliver our hardware products, such as Spectacles, to our customers on time, which may seriously harm our business.

We have limited manufacturing experience for our only physical product, Spectacles, and we do not have any internal manufacturing capabilities. Instead, we rely on contract manufacturers to build Spectacles. Our contract manufacturers are vulnerable to capacity constraints and reduced component availability, and our control over delivery schedules, manufacturing yields, and costs, particularly when components are in short supply, or if we introduce a new product or feature, is limited. In addition, we have limited control over our manufacturers’ quality systems and controls, and therefore must rely on our manufacturers to manufacture our products to our quality and performance standards and specifications. Delays, component shortages, including custom components that are manufactured for us at our direction, global trade conditions and agreements, and other manufacturing and supply problems could impair the distribution of our products and ultimately our brand. For example, the current U.S. Administration has threatened tougher trade terms with China and other countries, leading to the imposition or expected imposition of significant tariffs, which may adversely affect our products and seriously harm our business. Furthermore, any adverse change in our contract manufacturers’ financial or business condition or our relationship with our contract manufacturers could disrupt our ability to supply our products to our retailers and distributors. If we are required to change our contract manufacturers or assume internal manufacturing operations, we may lose revenue, incur increased costs, and damage our reputation and brand. Qualifying a new contract manufacturer and commencing production is expensive and time-consuming. In addition, if we experience increased demand for our products, we may need to increase our component purchases, contract-manufacturing capacity, and internal test and quality functions. The inability of our contract manufacturers to provide us with adequate supplies of high-quality products could delay our order fulfillment, and may require us to change the design of our products to meet this increased demand. Any redesign would require us to re-qualify our products with any applicable regulatory bodies, which would be costly and time-consuming. This may lead to unsatisfied customers and users and increase costs to us, which could seriously harm our business.

Components used in our products may fail as a result of a manufacturing, design, or other defect over which we have no control, and render our devices inoperable.

We rely on third-party component suppliers to provide some of the functionalities needed to operate and use our products, such as Spectacles. Any errors or defects in that third-party technology could result in errors in our products that could seriously harm our business. If these components have a manufacturing, design, or other defect, they can cause our products to fail and render them permanently inoperable. For example, the typical means by which our Spectacles product connects to mobile devices is by way of a Bluetooth transceiver located in the Spectacles product. If the Bluetooth transceiver in our Spectacles product were to fail, it would not be able to connect to a user’s mobile device and Spectacles would not be able to deliver any content to the mobile device and the Snapchat application. As a result, we would have to replace these products at our sole cost and expense. Should we have a widespread problem of this kind, the reputational damage and the cost of replacing these products could seriously harm our business.

The FDA and other state and foreign regulatory agencies regulate Spectacles. We may develop future products that are regulated as medical devices by the FDA. Government authorities, primarily the FDA and corresponding regulatory agencies, regulate the medical device industry. Unless there is an exemption, we must obtain regulatory approval from the FDA and corresponding agencies before we can market or sell a new regulated product or make a significant modification to an existing product. Obtaining regulatory clearances to market a medical device can be costly and time-consuming, and we may not be able to obtain these clearances or approvals on a timely basis, or at all, for future products. Any delay in, or failure to receive or maintain, clearance or approval for any medical device products under development could prevent us from launching new products. We could seriously harm our business and the ability to sell our products if we experience any product problems requiring FDA reporting, if we fail to comply with applicable FDA and other state or foreign agency

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regulations, or if we are subject to enforcement actions such as fines, civil penalties, injunctions, product recalls, or failure to obtain FDA or other regulatory clearances or approvals.

We have faced inventory risk with respect to our Spectacles products.

We have been and may in the future be exposed to inventory risks related to Spectacles as a result of rapid changes in product cycles and pricing, defective merchandise, changes in consumer demand and consumer spending patterns, changes in consumer tastes with respect to our products, and other factors. We try to accurately predict these trends and avoid overstocking or understocking inventory. Demand for products, however, can change significantly between the time inventory or components are ordered and the date of sale. The acquisition of certain types of inventory or components may require significant lead-time and prepayment and they may not be returnable. Failure to manage our inventory, supplier commitments, or customer expectations could seriously harm our business.

Risks Related to Ownership of Our Class A Common Stock

Holders of Class A common stock have no voting rights. As a result, holders of Class A common stock will not have any ability to influence stockholder decisions.

Class A common stockholders have no voting rights, unless required by Delaware law. As a result, all matters submitted to stockholders will be decided by the vote of holders of Class B common stock and Class C common stock. As of December 31, 2019, Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy control approximately 99% of our voting power, and Mr. Spiegel alone may exercise voting control over our outstanding capital stock. If Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy vote together, or if Mr. Spiegel acts alone, they will have control over all matters submitted to our stockholders for approval. In addition, because our Class A common stock carries no voting rights (except as required by Delaware law), the issuance of the Class A common stock in future offerings, in future stock-based acquisition transactions, or to fund employee equity incentive programs could prolong the duration of Mr. Spiegel’s and Mr. Murphy’s current relative ownership of our voting power and their ability to elect certain directors and to determine the outcome of all matters submitted to a vote of our stockholders. This concentrated control eliminates other stockholders’ ability to influence corporate matters and, as a result, we may take actions that our stockholders do not view as beneficial. As a result, the market price of our Class A common stock could be adversely affected.

We cannot predict the impact our capital structure and the concentrated control by our founders may have on our stock price or our business.

Although other U.S.-based companies have publicly traded classes of non-voting stock, to our knowledge, we were the first company to only list non-voting stock on a U.S. stock exchange. We cannot predict whether this structure, combined with the concentrated control by Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Murphy, will result in a lower trading price or greater fluctuations in the trading price of our Class A common stock, or will result in adverse publicity or other adverse consequences. In addition, some indexes have indicated they will exclude non-voting stock, like our Class A common stock, from their membership. For example, FTSE Russell, a provider of widely followed stock indexes, now requires new constituents of its indexes to have at least five percent of their voting rights in the hands of public stockholders. In addition, S&P Dow Jones, another provider of widely followed stock indexes, has stated that companies with multiple share classes will not be eligible for certain of their indexes. As a result, our Class A common stock is likely not eligible for these stock indexes. We cannot assure you that other stock indexes will not take a similar approach to FTSE Russell or S&P Dow Jones in the future. Exclusion from indexes could make our Class A common stock less attractive to investors and, as a result, the market price of our Class A common stock could be adversely affected.

Because our Class A common stock is non-voting, we and our stockholders are exempt from certain provisions of U.S. securities laws. This may limit the information available to holders of our Class A common stock.

Because our Class A common stock is non-voting, significant holders of our common stock are exempt from the obligation to file reports under Sections 13(d), 13(g), and 16 of the Exchange Act. These provisions generally require periodic reporting of beneficial ownership by significant stockholders, including changes in that ownership. For example, in November 2017, Tencent Holdings Limited notified us that it, together with its affiliates, acquired 145,778,246 shares of our non-voting Class A common stock via open market purchases. As a result of our capital structure, neither we nor Tencent is obligated to disclose changes in Tencent’s ownership of our Class A common stock, so there can be no assurance that you, or we, will be notified of any such changes. Our directors and officers are required to file reports under Section 16 of the Exchange Act. Our significant stockholders, other than directors and officers, are exempt from the “short-swing” profit recovery provisions of Section 16 of the Exchange Act and related rules with respect to their purchases and sales of our

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securities. As such, stockholders will be unable to bring derivative claims for disgorgement of profits for trades by significant stockholders under Section 16(b) of the Exchange Act unless the significant stockholders are also directors or officers.

Since our Class A common stock is our only class of stock registered under Section 12 of the Exchange Act and that class is non-voting, we are not required to file proxy statements or information statements under Section 14 of the Exchange Act, unless a vote of the Class A common stock is required by applicable law. Accordingly, legal causes of action and remedies under Section 14 of the Exchange Act for inadequate or misleading information in proxy statements may not be available to holders of our Class A common stock. If we do not deliver any proxy statements, information statements, annual reports, and other information and reports to the holders of our Class B common stock and Class C common stock, then we will similarly not provide any of this information to holders of our Class A common stock. Because we are not required to file proxy statements or information statements under Section 14 of the Exchange Act, any proxy statement, information statement, or notice of our annual meeting may not include all information under Section 14 of the Exchange Act that a public company with voting securities registered under Section 12 of the Exchange Act would be required to provide to its stockholders. Most of that information, however, will be reported in other public filings. For example, any disclosures required by Part III of Form 10-K as well as disclosures required by the NYSE for the year ended December 31, 2019 that are customarily included in a proxy statement are instead included in this Annual Report, rather than a proxy statement. But some information required in a proxy statement or information statement is not required in any other public filing. For example, we will not be required to comply with the proxy access rules under Section 14 of the Exchange Act. If we take any action in an extraordinary meeting of stockholders where the holders of Class A common stock are not entitled to vote, we will not be required to provide the information required under Section 14 of the Exchange Act. Nor will we be required to file a preliminary proxy statement under Section 14 of the Exchange Act. Since that information is also not required in a Form 10-K, holders of Class A common stock may not receive the information required under Section 14 of the Exchange Act with respect to extraordinary meetings of stockholders. In addition, we are not subject to the “say-on-pay” and “say-on-frequency” provisions of the Dodd–Frank Act. As a result, our stockholders do not have an opportunity to provide a non-binding vote on the compensation of our executive officers. Moreover, holders of our Class A common stock will be unable to bring matters before our annual meeting of stockholders or nominate directors at such meeting, nor can they submit stockholder proposals under Rule 14a-8 of the Exchange Act.

The trading price of our Class A common stock has been and will likely continue to be volatile.

The trading price of our Class A common stock has been and is likely to continue to be volatile. Shares of Class A common stock were sold in our IPO in March 2017 at a price of $17.00 per share. Since then, the trading price of our Class A common stock has ranged from $4.82 to $29.44 through December 31, 2019. For example, as of December 31, 2018, the trading price of our Class A common stock had declined 68% since our IPO in March 2017 but as of December 31, 2019, the trading price of our Class A common stock had increased 196% compared to the trading price on December 31, 2018. Declines or volatility in our trading price could make it more difficult to attract and retain talent, adversely impact employee retention and morale, and may require us to issue more equity to incentivize employees which could dilute stockholders. The market price of our Class A common stock may fluctuate or decline significantly in response to numerous factors, many of which are beyond our control, including:

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In addition, extreme price and volume fluctuations in the stock markets have affected and continue to affect many technology companies’ stock prices, including us. Often, their stock prices have fluctuated in ways unrelated or disproportionate to the companies’ operating performance. In the past, stockholders have filed securities class-action litigation following periods of market volatility. Beginning on May 16, 2017, we, certain of our officers and directors, and the underwriters for our IPO were named as defendants in securities class actions purportedly brought on behalf of purchasers of our Class A common stock. In January 2020, we entered into a preliminary agreement to settle the federal and state securities class actions. Any litigation could subject us to substantial costs, divert resources and the attention of management from our business, and seriously harm our business.

Conversion of the Convertible Notes may dilute the ownership interest of our stockholders or may otherwise depress the market price of our Class A common stock.

The conversion of some or all of the Convertible Notes may dilute the ownership interests of our stockholders. On conversion of the Convertible Notes, we have the option to pay or deliver, as the case may be, cash, shares of our Class A common stock, or a combination of cash and shares of our Class A common stock. If we elect to settle our conversion obligation in shares of our Class A common stock or a combination of cash and shares of our Class A common stock, any sales in the public market of our Class A common stock issuable on such conversion could adversely affect prevailing market prices of our Class A common stock. In addition, the existence of the Convertible Notes may encourage short selling by market participants because the conversion of the Convertible Notes could be used to satisfy short positions, or anticipated conversion of the Convertible Notes into shares of our Class A common stock, any of which could depress the market price of our Class A common stock.

We may still incur substantially more debt or take other actions that would diminish our ability to make payments on the Convertible Notes when due.

We and our subsidiaries may incur substantial additional debt in the future, subject to the restrictions contained in our current and future debt instruments. We are not restricted under the terms of the Indenture governing the Convertible Notes from incurring additional debt, securing existing or future debt, repurchasing our stock, making investments, paying dividends, recapitalizing our debt, or taking a number of other actions that could have the effect of diminishing our ability to make payments on the Convertible Notes when due.

The conditional conversion feature of the Convertible Notes, if triggered, may adversely affect our financial condition and operating results.

In the event the conditions for optional conversion of the Convertible Notes by holders are met before the close of business on the business day immediately preceding May 1, 2026, holders of the Convertible Notes will be entitled to convert the Convertible Notes at any time during specified periods at their option. If one or more holders elect to convert their Convertible Notes, unless we elect to satisfy our conversion obligation by delivering solely shares of our Class A common stock (other than paying cash in lieu of delivering any fractional share), we may settle all or a portion of our conversion obligation in cash, which could adversely affect our liquidity. In addition, even if holders do not elect to convert their Convertible Notes, we could be required under applicable accounting rules to reclassify all or a portion of the outstanding principal of the Convertible Notes as a current rather than long-term liability, which would result in a material reduction of our net working capital and may seriously harm our business.

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We entered into certain hedging positions that may affect the value of the Convertible Notes and the volatility and value of our Class A common stock.

In connection with the issuance of the Convertible Notes, we entered into certain hedging positions with certain financial institutions. These hedging positions are expected generally to reduce potential dilution of our Class A common stock on any conversion of the Convertible Notes or offset any cash payments we are required to make in excess of the principal amount of such converted Convertible Notes, as the case may be, with such reduction or offset subject to a cap.

The counterparties to these hedging positions or their respective affiliates may modify their hedge positions by entering into or unwinding various derivatives with respect to our Class A common stock or purchasing or selling our Class A common stock in secondary market transactions prior to the maturity of the Convertible Notes (and are likely to do so during any observation period related to a conversion of Convertible Notes or following any repurchase of Convertible Notes by us on any fundamental change repurchase date or otherwise). This activity could cause or avoid an increase or a decrease in the market price of our Class A common stock or the Convertible Notes. In addition, if any such hedging positions fail to become effective, the counterparties to these hedging positions or their respective affiliates may unwind their hedge positions, which could adversely affect the value of our Class A common stock.

Delaware law and provisions in our certificate of incorporation and bylaws, as well as our Indenture, could make a merger, tender offer, or proxy contest difficult or more expensive, thereby depressing the trading price of our Class A common stock.

Our certificate of incorporation and bylaws contain provisions that could depress the trading price of our Class A common stock by acting to discourage, delay, or prevent a change of control of our company or changes in our management that the stockholders of our company may deem advantageous. These provisions include the following:

Any provision of our certificate of incorporation, bylaws, or Delaware law that has the effect of delaying or deterring a change in control could limit the opportunity for our stockholders to receive a premium for their shares of our common stock, and could also affect the price that some investors are willing to pay for our Class A common stock.

Furthermore, certain provisions in the Indenture governing our Convertible Notes may make it more difficult or expensive for a third party to acquire us. For example, the Indenture requires us, at the holders’ election, to repurchase the Convertible Notes for cash on the occurrence of a fundamental change and, in certain circumstances, to increase the conversion rate for a holder that converts its Convertible Notes in connection with a make-whole fundamental change. A takeover of us may trigger the requirement that we repurchase the Convertible Notes or increase the conversion rate, which could make it more costly for a third party to acquire us. The Indenture also prohibits us from engaging in a merger or acquisition unless, among other things, the surviving entity assumes our obligations under the Convertible Notes and the Indenture. These and other provisions in the Indenture could deter or prevent a third party from acquiring us even when the acquisition may be favorable to holders of the Convertible Notes or our stockholders.

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Future sales of shares by existing stockholders could cause our stock price to decline.

If our existing stockholders, including employees and service providers who obtain equity, sell, or indicate an intention to sell, substantial amounts of our Class A common stock in the public market, the trading price of our Class A common stock could decline. As of December 31, 2019, we had outstanding a total of 1.2 billion shares of Class A common stock, 24.5 million shares of Class B common stock, and 231.1 million shares of Class C common stock. In addition, as of December 31, 2019, 149.3 million shares of Class A common stock, 1.6 million shares of Class B common stock, and 9.4 million shares of Class C common stock were subject to outstanding stock options and RSUs. All of our outstanding shares are eligible for sale in the public market, except approximately 415.5 million shares (including options exercisable and RSAs subject to forfeiture as of December 31, 2019) held by directors, executive officers, and other affiliates that are subject to volume limitations under Rule 144 of the Securities Act. Our employees, other service providers, and directors are subject to our quarterly trading window closures. In addition, we have reserved shares for issuance under our equity incentive plans. When these shares are issued and subsequently sold, it would be dilutive to existing stockholders and the trading price of our Class A common stock could decline.

If securities or industry analysts either do not publish research about us, or publish inaccurate or unfavorable research about us, our business, or our market, or if they change their recommendations regarding our common stock adversely, the trading price or trading volume of our Class A common stock could decline.

The trading market for our Class A common stock is influenced in part by the research and reports that securities or industry analysts may publish about us, our business, our market, or our competitors. If one or more of the analysts initiate research with an unfavorable rating or downgrade our Class A common stock, provide a more favorable recommendation about our competitors, or publish inaccurate or unfavorable research about our business, our Class A common stock price would likely decline. If any analyst who may cover us were to 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 the trading price or trading volume to decline. Since we provide only limited financial guidance, this may increase the probability that our financial results are perceived as not in line with analysts’ expectations, and could cause volatility to our Class A common stock price.

We do not intend to pay cash dividends for the foreseeable future.

We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our capital stock. We currently intend to retain any future earnings to finance the operation and expansion of our business, and we do not expect to declare or pay any cash dividends in the foreseeable future. As a result, you may only receive a return on your investment in our Class A common stock if the market price of our Class A common stock increases. In addition, our Credit Facility includes restrictions on our ability to pay cash dividends.

If we are unable to maintain effective internal control over financial reporting in the future, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports, and the market price of our Class A common stock may be seriously harmed.

We are required to maintain internal control over financial reporting, perform system and process evaluation and testing of those internal controls to allow management to report on their effectiveness, report any material weaknesses in such internal controls, and obtain an opinion from our independent registered public accounting firm regarding the effectiveness of such internal controls as required by Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, all of which is time-consuming, costly, and complicated. If we are unable to comply with these requirements in a timely manner, if we assert that our internal control over financial reporting is ineffective, if we identify material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting, or if our independent registered public accounting firm is unable to express an opinion or expresses a qualified or adverse opinion about the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting, investors may lose confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports and the market price of our Class A common stock could be negatively affected. In addition, we could become subject to investigations by the NYSE, the SEC, and other regulatory authorities, which could require additional financial and management resources.

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The requirements of being a public company may strain our resources, result in more litigation, and divert management’s attention.

We are subject to the reporting requirements of the Exchange Act, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the Dodd-Frank Act, the listing requirements of the NYSE, and other applicable securities rules and regulations. Complying with these rules and regulations have caused and will continue to cause us to incur additional legal and financial compliance costs, make some activities more difficult, be time-consuming or costly, and continue to increase demand on our systems and resources. The Exchange Act requires, among other things, that we file annual, quarterly, and current reports with respect to our business and operating results, and that our independent registered public accounting firm provide an attestation report on the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting.

By complying with public disclosure requirements, our business and financial condition are more visible, which we believe may result in increased threatened or actual litigation, including by competitors and other third parties. For example, beginning on May 16, 2017, we, certain of our officers and directors, and the underwriters of our IPO were named as defendants in securities class actions purportedly brought on behalf of purchasers of our Class A common stock. In January 2020, we entered into a preliminary agreement to settle the federal and state securities class actions. Shareholder litigation can subject us to substantial costs and divert resources and the attention of management from our business. If those claims are successful, our business could be seriously harmed. Even if the claims do not result in litigation or are resolved in our favor, the time and resources needed to resolve them could divert our management’s resources, impose large defense costs, and seriously harm our business.

Our certificate of incorporation provides that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware and the federal district courts of the United States of America will be the exclusive forums for substantially all disputes between us and our stockholders, which could limit our stockholders’ ability to obtain a favorable judicial forum for disputes with us or our directors, officers, or employees.

Our certificate of incorporation provides that the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware is the exclusive forum for:

This exclusive-forum provision, if permitted by applicable law, may limit a stockholder’s ability to bring a claim in a judicial forum that it finds favorable for disputes with us or our directors, officers, or other employees, which may discourage lawsuits against us and our directors, officers, and other employees. If a court were to find either exclusive-forum provision in our certificate of incorporation to be inapplicable or unenforceable in an action, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving the dispute in other jurisdictions, which could seriously harm our business.

Our certificate of incorporation further provides that the federal district courts of the United States of America will be the exclusive forum for resolving any complaint asserting a cause of action arising under the Securities Act. Recently, the Delaware Chancery Court issued an opinion invalidating such provision. In light of that recent decision, we will not attempt to enforce this provision of our certificate of incorporation to the extent it is not permitted by applicable law. As a result, we may incur additional costs associated with resolving disputes that would otherwise by restricted by that provision in other jurisdictions, which could seriously harm our business.

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Item 1B. Unresolved Staff Comments.

None.

Item 2. Properties.

Our corporate headquarters are located in Santa Monica, California, where we occupy approximately 544,000 square feet, including some remaining Venice locations and excluding leases we have ceased use primarily as a result of moving to a centralized corporate office. As of December 31, 2019, our global facilities totaled an aggregate of approximately 1.1 million square feet of leased office space. We also maintain offices in multiple locations in the United States and internationally in Europe, Asia, and Australia. We may add additional offices as we expand our business to other continents and countries. We believe that our facilities are sufficient for our current needs and that, should it be needed, additional facilities will be available to accommodate the expansion of our business.

Item 3. Legal Proceedings.

We are currently involved in, and may in the future be involved in, legal proceedings, claims, inquiries, and investigations in the ordinary course of our business, including claims for infringing intellectual property rights related to our products and the content contributed by our users and partners. Although the results of these proceedings, claims, inquiries, and investigations cannot be predicted with certainty, we do not believe that the final outcome of these matters is reasonably likely to have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, or results of operations. Regardless of final outcomes, however, any such proceedings, claims, and investigations may nonetheless impose a significant burden on management and employees and may come with costly defense costs or unfavorable preliminary and interim rulings.

Item 4. Mine Safety Disclosures.

Not applicable.

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PART II

Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities.

Market Information for Common Stock

Our Class A common stock has been listed on the NYSE under the symbol “SNAP” since March 2, 2017. Our Class B common stock and Class C common stock are not listed or traded on any stock exchange.

Holders of Record

As of December 31, 2019, there were 571 stockholders of record of our Class A common stock. Because many of our shares of Class A common stock are held by brokers and other institutions on behalf of stockholders, we are unable to estimate the total number of stockholders represented by these record holders. The closing price of our Class A common stock on December 31, 2019 was $16.33 per share as reported on the NYSE. As of December 31, 2019, there were 100 stockholders of record of our Class B common stock and two stockholders of record of our Class C common stock.

Dividend Policy

We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our capital stock. We intend to retain all available funds and future earnings, if any, to fund the development and expansion of our business, and we do not anticipate paying any cash dividends in the foreseeable future. The terms of our Credit Facility also restrict our ability to pay dividends, and we may also enter into credit agreements or other borrowing arrangements in the future that will restrict our ability to declare or pay cash dividends on our capital stock.

We have paid a stock dividend of our Class A common stock on our capital stock in the past and from time to time in the future may pay special or regular stock dividends in the form of Class A common stock, which per the terms of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation must be paid equally to all stockholders. Any future determination regarding the declaration and payment of dividends, if any, will be at the discretion of our board of directors and will depend on then-existing conditions, including our financial condition, operating results, contractual restrictions, capital requirements, business prospects, and other factors that our board of directors may deem relevant.

Purchases of Equity Securities by the Issuer and Affiliated Purchasers

None.

Stock Performance Graph

This performance graph shall not be deemed “filed” with the SEC for purposes of Section 18 of the Exchange Act, or incorporated by reference into any filing of Snap Inc. under the Securities Act.

The following graph shows a comparison from March 2, 2017 (the date our Class A common stock commenced trading on the NYSE) through December 31, 2019 of the cumulative total return for our Class A common stock, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Stock Index (S&P 500 Index), and the NYSE Composite. The graph assumes that $100 was invested at the market close on March 2, 2017 in our Class A common stock, the S&P 500 Index, and the NYSE Composite, and data for the S&P 500 Index and the NYSE Composite assumes reinvestment of any dividends. The stock price performance of the following graph is not necessarily indicative of future stock price performance.

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Item 6. Selected Financial Data.

The consolidated statements of operations data for each of the years ended December 31, 2019, 2018, and 2017 and the consolidated balance sheets data as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 are derived from our audited consolidated financial statements included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. The consolidated statements of operations data for the years ended December 31, 2016 and 2015 and the consolidated balance sheets data as of December 31, 2017, 2016, and 2015 are derived from our audited consolidated financial statements, except as otherwise noted, that are not included in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Our historical results are not necessarily indicative of our results in any future period. You should read the following selected consolidated financial data together with “Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” and our consolidated financial statements and the related notes included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. The selected consolidated financial data in this section are not intended to replace our consolidated financial statements and the related notes.

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Non-GAAP Financial Measures

To supplement our consolidated financial statements, which are prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP, we use certain non-GAAP financial measures, as described below, to understand and evaluate our core operating performance. These non-GAAP financial measures, which may be different than similarly titled measures used by other companies, are presented to enhance investors’ overall understanding of our financial performance and should not be considered a substitute for, or superior to, the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP.

We use the non-GAAP financial measure of Free Cash Flow, which is defined as net cash provided by (used in) operating activities, reduced by purchases of property and equipment. We believe Free Cash Flow is an important liquidity measure of the cash that is available, after capital expenditures, for operational expenses and investment in our business and is a key financial indicator used by management. Additionally, we believe that Free Cash Flow is an important measure since we use third-party infrastructure partners to host our services and therefore we do not incur significant capital expenditures to support revenue generating activities. Free Cash Flow is useful to investors as a liquidity measure because it measures our ability to generate or use cash. Once our business needs and obligations are met, cash can be used to maintain a strong balance sheet and invest in future growth.

We use the non-GAAP financial measure of Adjusted EBITDA, which is defined as net income (loss); excluding interest income; interest expense; other income (expense), net; income tax benefit (expense); depreciation and amortization; stock-based compensation expense and related payroll tax expense, and certain other non-cash or non-recurring items impacting net income (loss) from time to time. We believe that Adjusted EBITDA helps identify underlying trends in our business that could otherwise be masked by the effect of the expenses that we exclude in Adjusted EBITDA.

We believe that both Free Cash Flow and Adjusted EBITDA provide useful information about our financial performance, enhance the overall understanding of our past performance and future prospects, and allow for greater transparency with respect to key metrics used by our management for financial and operational decision-making. We are presenting the non-GAAP measures of Free Cash Flow and Adjusted EBITDA to assist investors in seeing our financial performance through the eyes of management, and because we believe that these measures provide an additional tool for investors to use in comparing our core financial performance over multiple periods with other companies in our industry.

These non-GAAP financial measures should not be considered in isolation from, or as substitutes for, financial information prepared in accordance with GAAP. There are a number of limitations related to the use of these non-GAAP financial measures compared to the closest comparable GAAP measure. Some of these limitations are that:

The following table presents a reconciliation of Free Cash Flow to net cash used in operating activities, the most comparable GAAP financial measure, for each of the periods presented:

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The following table presents a reconciliation of Adjusted EBITDA to net loss, the most comparable GAAP financial measure, for each of the periods presented:

Securities class actions legal charges in the fourth quarter of 2019 were related to a preliminary agreement to settle the securities class actions that arose following our IPO. The preliminary settlement agreement was signed in January 2020 and provided for a resolution of all of the pending claims in the stockholder class actions for $187.5 million. We recorded legal settlement expense, net of amounts directly covered by insurance, of $100.0 million. These charges are non-recurring and not reflective of underlying trends in our business.

We exited various operating leases prior to the end of the contractual lease term, primarily as a result of moving to a centralized corporate office located in Santa Monica, California. In the year ended December 31, 2018, we recorded lease exit charges of $33.0 million. The charges primarily included the present value of our remaining lease obligation on the cease use dates that occurred during the quarter, net of estimated sublease income. As of December 31, 2018, we had exited all properties associated with this event. Changes to our estimated sublease income, including actual contracted sublease income, may result in incremental lease exit charge activity in the period determined. Additionally, we recognized a gain on the sale of buildings sold as a result of moving to our centralized corporate office, which is included in lease exit charges above for the year ended December 31, 2018. These charges are non-recurring and not reflective of underlying trends in our business.

Reduction in force charges in the first quarter of 2018 were related to a reduction in force plan impacting approximately 7% of our global headcount, primarily in engineering and sales. The charges are composed primarily of severance expense and related payroll tax expense. These charges are non-recurring and not reflective of underlying trends in our business. Additionally, we recognized a stock-based compensation forfeiture benefit of $31.5 million, which is included in stock-based compensation expense above for the year ended December 31, 2018.

Spectacles inventory-related charges were primarily related to excess inventory reserves and inventory purchase commitment cancellation charges in the third quarter of 2017. These charges are non-recurring and not reflective of underlying trends in our business.

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Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.

The following discussion and analysis of our financial condition and results of operations should be read in conjunction with our consolidated financial statements and related notes included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. In addition to historical consolidated financial information, the following discussion contains forward-looking statements that reflect our plans, estimates, and beliefs that involve significant risks and uncertainties. Our actual results could differ materially from those discussed in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to those differences include those discussed below and elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, particularly in “Risk Factors,” “Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements,” and “Note Regarding User Metrics and Other Data.”

The following generally discusses 2019 and 2018 items and year-to-year comparisons between 2019 and 2018. Discussion of historical items and year-to-year comparisons between 2018 and 2017 that are not included in this discussion can be found in “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2018, filed with the SEC on February 6, 2019.

Overview of Full Year 2019 Results

Our key user metrics and financial results for fiscal year 2019 are as follows:

User Metrics

Financial Results

Overview

Snap Inc. is a camera company.

We believe that reinventing the camera represents our greatest opportunity to improve the way that people live and communicate. We contribute to human progress by empowering people to express themselves, live in the moment, learn about the world, and have fun together.

Our flagship product, Snapchat, is a camera application that helps people communicate visually with friends and family through short videos and images called Snaps.

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Trends in User Metrics

User Engagement

We define a Daily Active User as a registered Snapchat user who opens the Snapchat application at least once during a defined 24-hour period. We calculate average Daily Active Users for a particular quarter by adding the number of DAUs on each day of that quarter and dividing that sum by the number of days in that quarter. DAUs are broken out by geography because markets have different characteristics. We had 218 million DAUs on average in the fourth quarter of 2019, compared to 210 million in the prior quarter and 186 million in the fourth quarter of 2018.

Quarterly Average Daily Active Users

(in millions)

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Monetization

In the year ended December 31, 2019, we recorded revenue of $1.7 billion compared to revenue of $1.2 billion for the year ended December 31, 2018, an increase of 45% year-over-year. We monetize our business primarily through advertising. Our advertising products include Snap Ads and Sponsored Creative Tools.

We measure progress in our business using ARPU because it helps us understand the rate at which we’re monetizing our daily user base. We define ARPU as quarterly revenue divided by the average Daily Active Users.

ARPU was $2.58 in the fourth quarter of 2019, up from $2.09 a year ago and $2.12 in the third quarter of 2019. For purposes of calculating ARPU, revenue by user geography is apportioned to each region based on a determination of the geographic location in which advertising impressions are delivered, as this approximates revenue based on user activity. This differs from the presentation of our revenue by geography in the notes to our consolidated financial statements, where revenue is based on the billing address of the advertising customer.

Quarterly Average Revenue per User

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Results of Operations

Components of Results of Operations

Revenue

We generate substantially all of our revenue through the sale of our advertising products, which include Snap Ads and Sponsored Creative Tools, and measurement services, referred to as advertising revenue. Snap Ads may be subject to revenue sharing arrangements between us and the content partner. We also generate revenue from sales of our hardware product, Spectacles. This revenue is reported net of allowances for returns.

Cost of Revenue

Cost of revenue consists primarily of payments to third-party infrastructure partners for hosting our products, which include expenses related to storage, computing, and bandwidth costs. Cost of revenue also includes payments for content and third party selling costs, referred to as revenue share. In addition, cost of revenue includes advertising measurement services, and personnel-related costs, including salaries, benefits, and stock-based compensation expenses. In addition, cost of revenue includes facilities and other supporting overhead costs, including depreciation and amortization, and inventory costs for Spectacles.

Research and Development Expenses

Research and development expenses consist primarily of personnel-related costs, including salaries, benefits, and stock-based compensation expense for our engineers, designers, and other employees engaged in the research and development of our products. In addition, research and development expenses include facilities and other supporting overhead costs, including depreciation and amortization. Research and development costs are expensed as incurred.

Sales and Marketing Expenses

Sales and marketing expenses consist primarily of personnel-related costs, including salaries, benefits, commissions, and stock-based compensation expense for our employees engaged in sales and sales support, business development, media, marketing, corporate partnerships, and customer service functions. Sales and marketing expenses also include costs incurred for advertising, market research, tradeshows, branding, marketing, promotional expense, and public relations, as well as facilities and other supporting overhead costs, including depreciation and amortization.

General and Administrative Expenses

General and administrative expenses consist primarily of personnel-related costs, including salaries, benefits, and stock-based compensation expense for our finance, legal, information technology, human resources, and other administrative teams. General and administrative expenses also include facilities and supporting overhead costs, including depreciation and amortization, and external professional services.

Interest Income

Interest income consists primarily of interest earned on our cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities.

Interest Expense

Interest expense consists primarily of interest expense associated with our senior convertible notes, or the Convertible Notes, and commitment fees and amortization of financing costs related to our revolving credit facility. In the prior period, interest expense also included interest on build-to-suit lease financing obligations.

Other Income (Expense), Net

Other income (expense), net consists of realized gains and losses on sales of marketable securities, our portion of non-marketable investment income and losses, and foreign currency transaction gains and losses. Other income (expense), net also includes any gains or losses on divestitures of businesses.

Income Tax Benefit (Expense)

We are subject to income taxes in the United States and numerous foreign jurisdictions. These foreign jurisdictions have different statutory tax rates than the United States. Additionally, certain of our foreign earnings may also be taxable in the United States. Accordingly, our effective tax rates will vary depending on the relative proportion of foreign to domestic income, use of tax credits, changes in the valuation of our deferred tax assets and liabilities, and changes in tax laws.

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Adjusted EBITDA

We define Adjusted EBITDA as net income (loss), excluding interest income; interest expense; other income (expense), net; income tax benefit (expense); depreciation and amortization; stock-based compensation expense and related payroll tax expense; and certain other non-cash or non-recurring items impacting net income (loss) from time to time. We consider the exclusion of certain non-cash and non-recurring expenses in calculating Adjusted EBITDA to provide a useful measure for period-to-period comparisons of our business and for investors and others to evaluate our operating results in the same manner as does our management. Additionally, we believe that Adjusted EBITDA is an important measure since we use third-party infrastructure partners to host our services and therefore we do not incur significant capital expenditures to support revenue-generating activities. See “Selected Financial Data—Non-GAAP Financial Measures” for additional information and a reconciliation of net loss to Adjusted EBITDA.

Discussion of Results of Operations

The following table sets forth our consolidated statements of operations data:

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The following table sets forth the components of our consolidated statements of operations data for each of the periods presented as a percentage of revenue:

Revenue

2019 compared to 2018

Revenue for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $535.1 million compared to the same period in 2018. Revenue increased due to growth in advertising demand, which resulted in an increase in the number of impressions. We continue to optimize our self-serve platform, enabling advertisers to more easily access our inventory and reach more users at a lower price compared to the prior period.

Cost of Revenue

2019 compared to 2018

Cost of revenue for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $97.0 million, or 12%, compared to the same period in 2018. The increase in cost of revenue primarily consisted of increased revenue share costs of $54.4 million, consistent with our overall increase in revenue. Additionally, the increase was driven by increased infrastructure costs of $37.9 million, attributable to DAU growth and increased user activity between the periods, net of infrastructure cost efficiencies, and increased advertising measurement expenses.

Research and Development Expenses

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2019 compared to 2018

Research and development expenses for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $111.3 million compared to the same period in 2018. The increase was primarily driven by an increase in stock-based compensation expense of $124.1 million. The prior period included a $24.6 million stock-based compensation forfeiture benefit related to the 2018 reduction in force.

Sales and Marketing Expenses

2019 compared to 2018

Sales and marketing expenses for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $57.8 million compared to the same period in 2018. The increase was primarily driven by increased marketing investments of $52.6 million.

General and Administrative Expenses

2019 compared to 2018

General and administrative expenses for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $103.9 million compared to the same period in 2018. The increase was driven by an increase in legal expenses primarily due to the legal charges of $100.0 million for the preliminary settlement agreement of the securities class actions that arose following our IPO. Additionally, the increase was driven by an increase in personnel expenses of $21.3 million, primarily due to an increase in stock-based compensation expense, and an increase in professional service and other corporate expenses. The increase was partially offset by a decrease in facilities costs, as the prior period included $33.0 million of lease exit charges.

Interest Income

2019 compared to 2018

Interest income for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $8.8 million compared to the same period in 2018. The increase was primarily a result of higher interest rates on U.S. government-backed securities and a higher overall invested cash balance as a result of the Convertible Notes offering.

Interest Expense

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2019 compared to 2018

Interest expense for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $21.1 million, compared to the same period in 2018. The increase in interest expense in the current period relates to the Convertible Notes.

Other Income (Expense), Net

2019 compared to 2018

Other income, net for the year ended December 31, 2019 increased $67.3 million, compared to other expense, net of $8.2 million for the same period in 2018. Other income, net for the current year was primarily a result of a gain of $39.9 million on the divestiture of Placed, LLC, or Placed, a location-based measurement services company that was divested in 2019, as well as gains on non-marketable investments. Other expense, net in the prior year was primarily a result of $7.2 million of non-marketable investment impairment expense.

Income Tax Benefit (Expense)

2019 compared to 2018

Income tax expense was $0.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2019, compared to $2.5 million for the same period in 2018.

Our effective tax rate differs from the U.S. statutory tax rate primarily due to a valuation allowance on our deferred tax assets as it is more likely than not that some or all of our deferred tax assets will not be realized.

For additional discussion, see Note 11 to our consolidated financial statements included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Net Loss and Adjusted EBITDA

2019 compared to 2018

Net loss for the year ended December 31, 2019 was $1.0 billion, compared to $1.3 billion for the same period in 2018. Adjusted EBITDA loss for the year ended December 31, 2019 was $202.2 million, compared to $575.6 million for the same period in 2018. The decrease in Adjusted EBITDA loss was driven by increased revenues, partially offset by increased cost of revenue and marketing expenses. Additionally, the decrease in net loss was primarily a result of a gain of $39.9 million on the divestiture of Placed, as well as decreased facilities costs, as the prior period included lease exit charges of $33.0 million. The decrease was partially offset by an increase in legal expense of $100.0 million for the preliminary settlement agreement of securities class actions that arose following our IPO and an increase in stock-based compensation expense of $147.8 million.

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For a discussion of the limitations associated with using Adjusted EBITDA rather than GAAP measures and a reconciliation of this measure to net loss, see “Selected Financial Data—Non-GAAP Financial Measures.”

Unaudited Quarterly Results of Operations Data

The following table sets forth the primary components of our unaudited quarterly consolidated statements of cash flows for each of the four quarters in the periods ended December 31, 2019 and December 31, 2018. These unaudited quarterly statements of cash flows have been prepared on the same basis as our audited consolidated financial statements included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. In the opinion of management, the financial information reflects all normal recurring adjustments necessary for the fair statement of results of operations for these periods. This information should be read in conjunction with our consolidated financial statements and the related notes included in “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data” in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. The results of historical periods are not necessarily indicative of the results in any future period.