Salesforce.com 2015 Annual Report Download - page 28

our executive management team resulting from the hiring or departure of executives. Such changes in our
executive management team may be disruptive to our business. We are also substantially dependent on the
continued service of our existing development and operations personnel because of the complexity of our
services and technologies. We do not have employment agreements with any of our executive officers, key
management, development or operations personnel and they could terminate their employment with us at any
time. The loss of one or more of our key employees or groups could seriously harm our business.
In the technology industry, there is substantial and continuous competition for engineers with high levels of
experience in designing, developing and managing software and Internet-related services, as well as competition
for sales executives and operations personnel. We may not be successful in attracting and retaining qualified
personnel. We have from time to time experienced, and we expect to continue to experience, difficulty in hiring
and retaining highly skilled employees with appropriate qualifications. If we fail to attract new personnel or fail
to retain and motivate our current personnel, our business and future growth prospects could be severely harmed.
Any failure in our delivery of high-quality technical support services may adversely affect our
relationships with our customers and our financial results.
Our customers depend on our support organization to resolve technical issues relating to our applications.
We may be unable to respond quickly enough to accommodate short-term increases in customer demand for
support services. Increased customer demand for these services, without corresponding revenues, could increase
costs and adversely affect our operating results. In addition, our sales process is highly dependent on our
applications and business reputation and on positive recommendations from our existing customers. Any failure
to maintain high-quality technical support, or a market perception that we do not maintain high-quality support,
could adversely affect our reputation, our ability to sell our enterprise cloud computing solutions to existing and
prospective customers, and our business, operating results and financial position.
Periodic changes to our sales organization can be disruptive and may reduce our rate of growth.
We periodically change and make adjustments to our sales organization in response to market opportunities,
competitive threats, management changes, product introductions or enhancements, acquisitions, sales
performance, increases in sales headcount, cost levels and other internal and external considerations. Any such
future sales organization changes may result in a temporary reduction of productivity, which could negatively
affect our rate of growth. In addition, any significant change to the way we structure our compensation of our
sales organization may be disruptive and may affect our revenue growth.
Unanticipated changes in our effective tax rate and additional tax liabilities may impact our operating
results
We are subject to income taxes in the United States and various jurisdictions outside of the United States.
Our effective tax rate could fluctuate due to changes in the mix of earnings and losses in countries with differing
statutory tax rates. Our tax expense could also be impacted by changes in non-deductible expenses, changes in
excess tax benefits related to exercises and vesting of stock-based expense, changes in the valuation of deferred
tax assets and liabilities and our ability to utilize them and the applicability of withholding taxes.
We are subject to tax examinations in multiple jurisdictions. While we regularly evaluate new information
that may change our judgment resulting in recognition, derecognition or change in measurement of a tax position
taken, there can be no assurance that the final determination of any examinations will not have an adverse effect
on our operating results and financial position.
Our tax provision could also be impacted by changes in federal, state or international tax laws including
fundamental tax law changes applicable to corporate multinationals currently being considered by many
countries including the United States as well as several European countries.
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