Autodesk 2012 Annual Report Download - page 82

Our financial results fluctuate within each quarter and from quarter to quarter making our future revenue and financial results
difficult to predict.
Our quarterly financial results have fluctuated in the past and may do so in the future. These fluctuations could cause our
stock price to change significantly or experience declines. In addition to the other factors described in this Part I, Item 1A,
some of the factors that could cause our financial results to fluctuate include:
• general market, economic, business and political conditions, including the impact of sales in particular geographies,
including emerging economies,
• the ability of governments around the world to meet their financial and debt obligations, and finance infrastructure
projects,
• lower growth or contraction of our upgrade or maintenance programs,
• fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates and the success of our hedging activity,
• failure to expand our AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT products customer base to related design products,
• the timing of the introduction of new products by us or our competitors,
• the success of new business or sales initiatives and increasing our portfolio of product suites (“suites”),
• failure to maintain our revenue growth and profitability,
• the financial and business condition of our reseller and distribution channels,
• weak or negative growth in the industries we serve, including architecture, engineering and construction, manufacturing
and digital media and entertainment markets,
• failure to accurately predict the impact of acquired businesses or to identify and realize the anticipated benefits of
acquisitions, and successfully integrate such acquired businesses and technologies,
• perceived or actual technical or other problems with a product or combination of products,
• unexpected or negative outcomes of matters and expenses relating to litigation or regulatory inquiries,
• failure to achieve anticipated levels of customer acceptance of key new applications,
• restructuring or other accounting charges and unexpected costs or other operating expenses,
• pricing pressure or changes in product pricing or product mix,
• platform changes,
• timing of product releases and retirements,
• failure to continue momentum of frequent release cycles or to move a significant number of customers from prior
product versions in connection with our programs to retire major products,
• failure to achieve and maintain planned cost reductions and productivity increases,
• changes in tax laws or regulations, tax arrangements with foreign governments or accounting rules, such as increased use
of fair value measures and the potential requirement that U.S. registrants prepare financial statements in accordance with
International Financial Reporting Standards (“IFRS”),
• changes in sales compensation practices,
• dependence on and the timing of large transactions,
• failure to effectively implement our copyright legalization programs, especially in developing countries,
• our inability to rapidly adapt to technological and customer preference changes, including those related to cloud
computing, mobile devices, and new computing platforms,
• failure to achieve sufficient sell-through in our channels for new or existing products,
• renegotiation or termination of royalty or intellectual property arrangements,
• interruptions or terminations in the business of our consultants or third party developers,
• the timing and degree of expected investments in growth and efficiency opportunities,
• failure to achieve continued success in technology advancements, and
• natural disasters such as the earthquakes and tsunami in Japan in March 2011.
We have also experienced fluctuations in financial results in interim periods in certain geographic regions due to
seasonality or regional economic conditions. In particular, our financial results in Europe during our third quarter are usually
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