Autodesk 2009 Annual Report Download - page 106

ITEM 7. MANAGEMENT’S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND
RESULTS OF OPERATIONS
The discussion in our MD&A contains trend analyses and other forward-looking statements within the
meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.
Forward-looking statements are any statements that look to future events and consist of, among other things, our
business strategies, anticipated future operating results, including net revenue, operating margins, product
backlog, upgrade, crossgrade and maintenance revenue, the impact of our restructuring activities, the impact of
acquisitions and investment activities, the effect of fluctuations in exchange rates on net revenue and expenses,
costs and expenses, including cost of revenue and operating expenses, future income, our anticipated tax rate,
and our ability to successfully expand our 2D horizontal customer base to our 2D vertical products and 3D
model-based design products. In addition, forward-looking statements also consist of statements involving
expectations regarding product acceptance, continuation of our stock repurchase program, and short-term and
long-term cash requirements, as well as, statements involving trend analyses and statements including such
words as “may,” “believe,” “could,” “anticipate,” “would,” “might,” “plan,” “expect,” and similar
expressions or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. These forward-looking statements
speak only as of the date of this Annual Report on Form 10-K and are subject to business and economic risks. As
such, our actual results could differ materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements as a result
of the factors set forth above in Item 1A, “Risk Factors,” and in our other reports filed with the U.S. Securities
and Exchange Commission. We assume no obligation to update the forward-looking statements to reflect events
that occur or circumstances that exist after the date on which they were made.
Strategy
Our goal is to be the world’s leading 2D and 3D design and engineering software and services company for
the architecture, engineering, and construction, manufacturing, geospatial mapping, and digital media and
entertainment markets. Worldwide business trends such as globalization, sustainability, investment in
infrastructure, and the increasing desire to keep data digital, are creating pressure on our customers to improve
innovation while enhancing productivity. We offer our customers the ability to visualize and simulate real-world
performance early in the design process through digital prototyping to foster innovation, enhance quality, and
save time and money for competitive advantage. Our customers are seeking differentiation through design, and
we believe our products provide a competitive advantage to succeed in this environment.
We believe that our ability to make technology available to mainstream markets is one of our competitive
advantages. By innovating in existing technology categories, we bring powerful design products to volume
markets. Our products are designed to be easy to learn and use, and to provide customers low cost of deployment,
low total cost of ownership and a rapid return on investment. In addition, our software architecture allows for
extensibility and integration with other products. We believe that our technological leadership, brand recognition,
breadth of product line and large installed base will help us weather the economic storm and position us well for
an eventual recovery.
We have created a large global community of distributors and resellers, third-party developers and customers.
These relationships provide us with a broad reach into volume markets. Our distributor and reseller network is
extensive and provides our customers with global resources for the purchase and support of our products as well as
resources for effective and cost efficient training services. We believe the strength of our channel will help us
maintain our leadership throughout the economic downturn. The overall health of our channel partners remains
vitally important to us. We have an active partner assistance program in place on a global basis, and we will
continue to work closely with our partners in a collaborative effort to fight through the current economic
downturn. We have a significant number of registered third-party developers that create products that operate with
our software products, further extending our reach into volume markets. Users trained on our products are broadly
available both from educational institutions and the existing work force, reducing the cost of training for our
customers. To train the next generation of users, we offer education programs, including classroom support,
standardized curricula, instructor development, and specially priced software-purchasing options.
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