HP 2015 Annual Report Download - page 31

Table of Contents
•persuading employees that business cultures are compatible, maintaining employee morale and retaining key employees, engaging with
employee works councils representing an acquired company's non-U.S. employees, integrating employees, correctly estimating employee
benefit costs and implementing restructuring programs;
•coordinating and combining administrative, manufacturing, research and development and other operations, subsidiaries, facilities and
relationships with third-parties in accordance with local laws and other obligations while maintaining adequate standards, controls and
procedures;
•achieving savings from supply chain integration; and
•managing integration issues shortly after or pending the completion of other independent transactions.
We may not achieve some or all of the expected benefits of our restructuring plan and our restructuring may adversely affect our business.
We announced a restructuring plan in September 2015 to realign our cost structure due to the changing nature of our business and to achieve operating
efficiencies that we expect to reduce costs. We may not be able to obtain the cost savings and benefits that were initially anticipated in connection with our
restructuring. Additionally, as a result of our restructuring, we may experience a loss of continuity, loss of accumulated knowledge and/or inefficiency during
transitional periods. Reorganization and restructuring can require a significant amount of management and other employees' time and focus, which may
divert attention from operating and growing our business. If we fail to achieve some or all of the expected benefits of restructuring, it could have a material
adverse effect on our competitive position, business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows. For more information about our restructuring
plan, including details regarding the plan announced in September 2015, see Note 3 to our Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8.
Our financial performance may suffer if we cannot continue to develop, license or enforce the intellectual property rights on which our businesses depend.
We rely upon patent, copyright, trademark, trade secret and other intellectual property laws in the United States, similar laws in other countries, and
agreements with our employees, customers, suppliers and other parties, to establish and maintain intellectual property rights in the products and services we
sell, provide or otherwise use in our operations. However, any of our intellectual property rights could be challenged, invalidated, infringed or circumvented,
or such intellectual property rights may not be sufficient to permit us to take advantage of current market trends or to otherwise provide competitive
advantages, either of which could result in costly product redesign efforts, discontinuance of certain product offerings or other harm to our competitive
position. For example, our enforcement of inkjet printer supplies IP against infringers may be successfully challenged or our IP may be successfully
circumvented. Further, the laws of certain countries do not protect proprietary rights to the same extent as the laws of the United States. Therefore, in certain
jurisdictions we may be unable to protect our proprietary technology adequately against unauthorized third-party copying or use; this, too, could adversely
affect our ability to sell products or services and our competitive position.
Our products and services depend in part on intellectual property and technology licensed from third parties.
Some of our business and some of our products rely on key technologies developed or licensed by third-parties. We may not be able to obtain or
continue to obtain licenses and technologies from these third-parties at all or on reasonable terms, or such third-parties may demand cross-licenses to our
intellectual property. For example, some of our software offerings are developed using software components or other intellectual property licensed from third
parties, including through both proprietary and open source licenses. These third-party software components may become obsolete,
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Source: HP INC, 10-K, December 16, 2015 Powered by Morningstar® Document Research℠
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