UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

Form 10-K

(Mark One)

For the fiscal year ended June 30, 2020

OR

For the transition period from              to             .

Commission file number 000-25711

Extreme Networks, Inc.

(Exact name of Registrant as specified in its charter)

Registrant’s telephone number, including area code: (408) 579-2800

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 Section 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 (§229.405 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, smaller reporting company, or an emerging growth company. See the definitions 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 check mark 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 voting common equity held by non-affiliates of the Registrant was approximately $0.7 billion as of December 31, 2019 the last business day of the Registrant’s most recently completed second fiscal quarter, based upon the per share closing price of the Registrant’s common stock as reported on The Nasdaq Global Market reported on such date.  For purposes of this disclosure, shares of common stock held or controlled by executive officers and directors of the registrant and by persons who hold more than 5% of the outstanding shares of common stock have been treated as shares held by affiliates. This calculation does not reflect a determination that certain persons are affiliates of the Registrant for any other purpose.

Indicate the number of shares outstanding of each of the registrant’s classes of stock, as of the latest practicable date.

122,544,308 shares of the Registrant’s Common stock, $.001 par value, were outstanding as of August 25, 2020.

DOCUMENTS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE

Portions of the registrant's definitive proxy statement for the year ended June 30, 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders to be filed with the Commission pursuant to Regulation 14A not later than 120 days after the end of the fiscal year covered by this Annual Report on Form 10-K are incorporated herein by reference in Part III of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

EXTREME NETWORKS, INC.

FORM 10-K

INDEX

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FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS

Except for historical information contained herein, certain matters included in this annual report on Form 10-K are, or may be deemed to be, forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933. The words “will,” “may,” “designed to,” “believe,” “should,” “anticipate,” “plan,” “expect,” “intend,” “estimate” and similar expressions identify forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this annual report. These forward-looking statements are contained principally under Item 1, “Business,” and under Item 7, “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” but may also be in other sections of this annual report on Form 10-K. Because these forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, actual results could differ materially from the expectations expressed in the forward-looking statements. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements include those described in Item 1A, “Risk Factors” and Item 7, “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.” In addition, new risks emerge from time to time and it is not possible for management to predict all such risk factors or to assess the impact of such risk factors on our business. Given these risks and uncertainties, you should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. We undertake no obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances.

PART I

Item1. Business

Overview

Extreme Networks, Inc., together with its subsidiaries (collectively referred to as “Extreme” and as “we”, “us” and “our”) is a leader in providing cloud-driven networking solutions for enterprise, data center, and service provider customers from the IoT edge to the cloud that are agile, adaptive, and secure to enable autonomous enterprises of the future. In providing a combined end-to-end solution from the enterprise edge to the cloud, Extreme designs, develops, and manufactures wired and wireless network infrastructure equipment as well as designs and develops a leading cloud networking platform and application portfolio using cloud management, machine learning, and artificial intelligence to deliver network policy, analytics, security, and access controls. Extreme cloud-driven technologies provide flexibility and scalability in deployment, management, and licensing of networks globally, and the global cloud footprint provides service to over 50,000 customers and over 10 million daily users.

Even as we increased the breadth of our portfolio and scale of our organization over the past several years, we continue to value the attributes of a small company by remaining nimble and responsive to create effortless networking experiences that enable all of us to advance. We are relentless in our commitment to our 50,000 customers and 7,000 partners around the world, building networks that leverage the power of machine learning, artificial intelligence, analytics, and automation to drive competitive advantage, accelerate innovation, and improve the human experience.

Enterprise network administrators need to respond to the rapid digital transformational trends of cloud, mobility, big data, social business, and the ever-present need for network security.  In January 2020, an outbreak of a new strain of coronavirus, COVID-19, was identified in Wuhan, China. Through the first quarter of 2020, the disease became widespread around the world, and on March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared the outbreak a pandemic. Particularly in 2020, COVID-19 has accelerated digital transformation efforts for organizations everywhere, driving rapid adoption of new cloud technologies to support remote working and online learning.  For organizations bringing employees back to work and students back into schools, technology drivers such as IoT (Internet of Things), Robotics automation, occupancy management, and contact tracing applications have a profound effect across the entire enterprise network by placing unprecedented demands on network administrators to enhance management capabilities, scalability, programmability, agility, security, and analytics of the enterprise networks they manage.

Improving the network experience for enterprises that increasingly require greater simplification at the edge or the access layer of the network remains a key focus for Extreme. In fiscal year 2020 we augmented our cloud and infrastructure offerings by closing the acquisition of Aerohive Networks, which allowed us to focus our product and go to market strategy on delivering ease and simplicity in deployment, management, licensing, and operation of networking, with a particular emphasis on Wi-Fi, security, and analytics. Cloud-Driven Networking positions us to deliver effortless experiences to organizations of various sizes by combining our software-driven applications with machine learning and artificial intelligence to assist in collecting data to build, secure, and maintain agile and distributed environments. In addition, we are the only major vendor who can provide these enterprise-class capabilities in public cloud, private cloud, and on-premises deployment options with a single, unified license and end-to-end portfolio.

We have chosen to focus on enterprise cloud networking based on compelling benefits we believe we can offer our customers. Legacy approaches to network management have relied on complex enterprise applications that customers must install, integrate, maintain, and administer. New releases were infrequent, and updates installed by customers even less frequent. In contrast, our cloud-based ExtremeCloud IQ application provides a single, integrated management view across the entire network that a customer can access from virtually anywhere. We maintain and administer the network management application in global regional data centers from Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and Microsoft Azure, delivering the industry’s only completely cloud-

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agnostic network management application which users then access as a subscription service that can be regularly updated in response to new features or urgent changes.

With our innovations in cloud management, we believe we can deliver a number of important capabilities to our customers. While enterprise customers want simplified network management, they still need a full set of features and capabilities. Our “progressive disclosure” user interface means that advanced features are available but are hidden from view when not being used. Similarly, organizations that need to deploy the network often do not have technical staff at every location. Our cloud management supports automated provisioning, where a device that is connected to the network for the first time can automatically find and download its proper configuration. Our cloud management solution also includes troubleshooting capabilities, such as customized vertical-specific dashboards with Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), to identify potential issues, and monitoring, to research and resolve them. Finally, cloud management makes it possible for a customer to evaluate the capabilities of our solution. Overall, by taking advantage of our innovative capabilities, our customers are able to manage even large networks with a small staff and limited resources. Intelligence and automation are key if enterprises are to derive maximum benefit from their cloud deployments.

To facilitate the readers understanding, the following is a list of common terms in our industry used in the discussion of our business:

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Industry Background

Enterprises are adopting new IT delivery models and applications that require fundamental network alterations and enhancements spanning from the access edge to the data center. With the impact of COVID-19, IT teams in every industry will need more control and better insights than ever before to ensure secure distributed connectivity and comprehensive centralized visibility. Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies have the potential to vastly improve the network experience in this post-pandemic world by collating large data sets to increase accuracy and derive resolutions to improve the operation of the network. When ML and AI are applied with cloud-driven networking and automation, administrators can quickly scale to provide productivity, availability, accessibility, manageability, security, and speed, regardless of how distributed the network is.

We believe that the network has never been more vital than it is today. As administrators grapple with more data, coming from more places, more connected devices, and more SaaS-based applications, the cloud is fundamental to establishing a new normal. Traditional network offerings are not well-suited to fulfill enterprise expectations for rapid delivery of new services, more flexible business models, real-time response, and massive scalability.  

As enterprises continue migrated increasing numbers of applications and services to either private clouds or public clouds offered by third parties and are adopting new IT delivery models and applications, this requires fundamental network alterations and enhancements spanning from device access point to the network core.  In either case, the network infrastructure must adapt to this new dynamic environment. Intelligence and automation are key if enterprises are to derive maximum benefit from their cloud deployments.

Customers are beginning to regain a sense of normalcy following the worldwide outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Extreme stands to benefit from the use of its technology to manage distributed campus network architecture centrally from the cloud. Extreme has blended a dynamic fabric attach architecture, that delivers simplicity for moves and changes at the edge of the network, together with corporate-wide role-based policy. This enables customers to migrate to new cloud managed switching and Wi-Fi, agnostic of the existing networking or wireless equipment they already have installed. In the end, we expect these customers to see lower capex, lower subscription costs, lower cost of ownership and get higher flexibility along with a more resilient network.

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We estimate the total addressable market for our solutions consisting of Cloud Networking, Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN), Data Center networking, Ethernet switching, campus LAN, and Software-Defined WAN (SD-WAN) solutions is approximately $27 billion and growing at approximately five percent per year over the next three years.  We believe Extreme’s products, solutions, and services along with our geographic focus allow us to address $20 billion of this market.

We believe that the networking industry, while heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, will recover and provide the foundation for the technological change necessary to move forward as key drivers emerge in the technology space:

Our strategy, product portfolio and research and development are closely aligned with what we have identified as the following trends in our industry:

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The Extreme Strategy

We are focused on delivering cloud-driven end-to-end networking and software solutions for today’s enterprise environments. From wireless and wired access technologies, through the campus, core, and into the datacenter, Extreme is developing solutions to deliver outstanding business outcomes for our customers. Leveraging a unified management approach, both on-premises and in the cloud, we continue to accelerate adoption and delivery of new technologies in support of emerging trends in enterprise networking. We continue to execute on our growth objectives by seeking to maximize customer, partner, and stockholder value.  As we advance our strategy to transition our business to subscription-oriented Cloud solutions, we also plan to change the mix of our revenue to a more recurring basis.

In fiscal 2017, we completed the acquisition of the WLAN Business from Zebra. In fiscal 2018, we completed the acquisitions of the Campus Fabric Business from Avaya and the Data Center Business from Brocade. In August 2019, we acquired the entire Cloud Networking portfolio from Aerohive. These acquisitions support our growth strategy to lead the enterprise network equipment market with end-to-end software-driven cloud and on-premises solutions for enterprise customers from the data center to the wireless edge. After the closing of the acquisitions of the Campus Fabric Business and Data Center Business, Extreme immediately became a networking industry leader with more than 30,000 customers. In addition, the acquisition of Aerohive brought us another 20,000+ customers and solidifies our position as the second ranked cloud networking provider globally.  Our acquisitions and resulting scale have given us brand recognition and built franchise value in the enterprise sector.  Today, Extreme is better positioned than ever before for new growth opportunities given our end-to-end product portfolio, the most advanced Cloud platform, network automation software from IoT wireless edge to datacenter, our status as a leader in the Gartner magic quadrant, our #1 position in service and our large base of 50,000 customers. As a network switching leader in enterprise, datacenter, and cloud, we combine and extend our world-class products and technologies to provide customers with some of the most advanced, high performance and open solutions in the market as well as a superb overall customer experience.  The combination of all the Extreme Elements^TM is significant in that it brings together distinct strengths addressing the key areas of the network, from unified wired and wireless edge, to the enterprise core, to the data center to offer a complete, unified portfolio of cloud-driven network access solutions.  With the integration progress, product and engineering efforts underway, and market position we have established, the go-to-market pivot is the final step in our transformational journey that began in 2015.  The growth of the cloud networking portion of the networking market from $2.6 billion in 2019 to over $7 billion by 2023, according to IHS, creates a unique white space opportunity for us to leverage our capabilities and gain share in this developing segment of the enterprise networking market.

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Key elements of our strategy include:

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Data can be mined to show how applications are being used enabling a better understanding of user behavior on the network, identifying the level of user engagement and assuring business application delivery to optimize the user experience. Application adoption can be tracked to determine the return on investment associated with new application deployment.

Visibility into network and application performance enables our customers to pinpoint and resolve performance bottlenecks in the infrastructure whether they are caused by the network, application or server. This saves both time and money for the business and helps to ensure critical applications are running at the best possible performance.

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We seek to differentiate ourselves in the market by delivering a value proposition based on a software-driven approach to network management, control and analytics.

Our key points of differentiation include:

Products

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Our cloud-driven networking products offer ML and AI powered high-performance networking, granular visibility and control, and strategic intelligence for business innovation and operational simplicity. Our 4^th generation cloud architecture provides a foundation for delivering more “Value as a Service” options to our customers by delivering intelligent, ML-assisted insights along with applications for network policy, analytics, security, and access control. We have the most comprehensive end-to-end portfolio that spans from the access edge to the cloud, with an emphasis on agile, adaptive, and secure access points, switches, and routers. Our hardware portfolio delivers powerful fabric technologies to enable network-wide automation that provides simple “plug-and-play” operation and much faster time-to-service. We build our products into vertical market solutions with customized dashboards and features for converged campus networks that provide user and device mobility.  Data Center and Cloud administrators are able to virtualize their servers and storage over our high-performance Ethernet infrastructure. Extreme’s cloud-driven access control and analytics software provides security, visibility, control, and strategic intelligence from the Data Center to the Edge.

Our product categories include:

•     4^th Generation Cloud Networking Platform: Core to our product portfolio and providing the end-to-end visibility from the access edge to the data center is our industry-first 4^th generation cloud platform and cloud management application, ExtremeCloud IQ. ExtremeCloud IQ is an ML/AI powered, wired and wireless cloud network management solution that offers advanced visibility and control over users, devices, and applications. ExtremeCloud IQ keeps operational cost low, adjusts to customer demand, and delivers robust functionality for provisioning, management, and troubleshooting, as well as the industry’s only unlimited data access for the life of the subscription, and guaranteed data durability to assure access with 100% uptime. ExtremeCloud IQ also empowers our partner community and Managed Service Providers (“MSPs”) to explore new revenue streams without additional investment in Cloud infrastructure. Integrated application analytics allow MSPs to deliver insights about how customer networks are being used and which policies they need to implement to optimize the user experience. Elasticity and extensive Representational State Transfer (“REST”) APIs enable end-to-end automation and empower MSPs to be more agile and responsive to customer needs. The APIs combined with zero-touch provisioning, multi-tenancy, and delegation allows MSPs to optimize their operations and address the needs of geographically distributed customers from a single location. The ExtremeCloud IQ application already manages over a million devices and 10 million clients in the public, private, and on-premises global cloud deployment, and produces over 6 petabytes of data per day that is used with machine learning to deliver valuable insights and analytics to Extreme customers.

•    Automation, Analytics, and Security Applications: Our application portfolio delivers additional analytics, security, access control, and management insights both on-premises and in the cloud. In addition to powerful applications such as ExtremeLocation and ExtremeCompliance, Extreme Management Center empowers our customers to turn their network into a strategic business asset that drives crucial business objectives. It provides visibility, control, and meaningful information across the wired and wireless network, from the edge to the private cloud, and across multi-vendor environments. Extreme Management Center gives IT departments visibility and automated control over users, devices, and applications by enabling them to manage, automate, and report on the entire network and applications. With Extreme Management Center, IT can correlate network and application performance with user and device activities to troubleshoot issues quickly. Strategic information from the network allows enterprises to make real-time decisions on policies, devices, applications, and people. This way, the implementation of new technologies such as BYOD and IoT can be automated and securely executed. Customers can deploy, configure, monitor and support the complete range of wired, wireless and switching infrastructure and set network-wide policy to enable enterprises to reduce the overall cost of network administration and operations, protect corporate resources and provide a consistently high-quality user experience that is managed through a single pane of glass, no need to switch screens or applications.

Key product features include:

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ExtremeAnalytics is a network-powered application analytics and optimization solution that captures network data, then aggregates, analyzes, correlates, and reports on it to enable better decision making and improved business performance. Granular visibility into network and application performance, users, locations and devices empower our customers to make data-driven business decisions. Customers can save operational costs, solve issues faster, and deliver a superior end user experience with real-time data in one easy-to-read dashboard. Our solution speeds up troubleshooting by separating the network from application performance, so IT can quickly identify root-causes. ExtremeAnalytics makes our customers’ networks safer as it monitors shadow IT, identifies and reports malicious or unwanted applications, and monitors security compliance. Because of the value ExtremeAnalytics provides, Extreme was selected as the Official Wi-Fi & Analytics Provider for the NFL.

Key product features include:

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In addition to powering large venues and stadiums, our Extreme Access Points also deliver flexible and scalable options for highly distributed environments at top brands globally. Our APs allow our customers to purchase unified hardware, starting with our Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) access point portfolio, and choose the software mode option for the optimal deployment architecture in their environment. In fiscal year 2020, we introduced updates to AirDefense; a premier wireless security solution, delivering intrusion detection and prevention capabilities across the wireless portfolio.

•     Edge, Campus, and Data Center Switching: Our switching portfolio includes products designed to make every connection effortless by enabling the deployment of high speed performance at scale for access, high-density, campus, core, and data center environments. Within the ExtremeSwitching portfolio are Access Edge products offering connection speeds ranging from 100M to 25G – including edge multi-rate 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps capabilities. These Switches provide various physical presentations (copper and fiber) along with options to deliver traditional Ethernet or convergence-friendly Power-over-Ethernet (“POE”), including high-power universal POE consisting of 90W power to support new classes of Ethernet-powered devices. These Switching products, combined with our unique Fabric capability, deliver automation and hypersegmentation, as well as features, performance, and reliability required by our customers to deploy, operate and manage converged infrastructure, along with the ability to harden the perimeter of the network infrastructure.  

Our Aggregation/Core Switches are designed to address the demanding needs of Aggregation, Top-of-Rack, and Campus Core environments.  Delivering 10G, 25G, 40G, 50G, and 100G connectivity with maximum throughput and reliability, these switches provide flexible Ethernet connectivity over a range of interface types and speeds and are available in both fixed and modular configurations. These Switching platforms, in conjunction with our advanced operating systems and centralized management software, provide the density, performance, and reliability required to serve in a diverse range of environments, especially where application demands and uptime expectations are mission-critical.

Our campus switch portfolio also includes next-generation, low-profile, high-density Ethernet switches that empower the creation of versatile always-on campus solutions that are Fabric-enabled and 25 to 100 Gigabit-ready. The technologies supported by these innovative platforms can also leverage automated network attachment to proactively reduce operational burden and time-to-service.

Extreme’s Data Center switches and routers provide high levels of reliability and throughput - specifically designed to address the exacting demands of high-performance enterprise and Cloud Data Centers.  These products are available in both fixed and modular chassis configurations and include a set of advanced features such as redundant management and fabric modules, hot-swappable line cards on our chassis-based platforms, as well as multi-speed stacking of up to 100G and flexible 10/25/40/50/100G port options on our fixed-form platforms, which makes these switches well-suited for a majority of enterprise Data Center environments.  Both platform types also provide redundant power supplies and fan trays to ensure high hardware availability.  

These switches also provide key feature extensions for Data Centers through technologies that include Virtual Extensible LAN (“VXLAN”), MPLS/VPLS, and Shortest Path Bridging capabilities. Our industry-first integrated Extreme Fabric Automation (EFA) simplifies and adds scalability to even the highest performance environments. In addition to these capabilities, our Data Center Switches offer innovative traffic optimization enabling Virtual Machine (“VM”) mobility via Layer 3 Data Center Interconnect.  Our architecture delivers tens of millions of flows for deep visibility and control over users, services, and applications to meet the analytic and policy demands of today’s business applications.  

•   SD-WAN Routing: The SD-WAN portfolio of products simplifies and secures networks from the branch to the cloud. ExtremeRouting delivers cloud-managed access across distributed environments, providing increased throughput, secure application-aware traffic shaping and monitoring, end-to-end Quality of Service (QoS), and dynamic link prioritization. These devices can be deployed with ease and at scale, and managed along with Extreme access points and switches to deliver a full-stack cloud-managed distributed networking solutions.

Sales, Marketing and Distribution

We conduct our sales and marketing activities on a worldwide basis through a channel that utilizes distributors, resellers and our field sales organization. As of June 30, 2020, our worldwide sales and marketing organization consisted of 896 employees, including vice presidents, directors, managers, sales representatives, and technical and administrative support personnel. We have domestic sales offices located in eight states and international sales offices located in 33 countries.

We sell our products primarily through an ecosystem of channel partners who combine our Extreme Elements^TM consisting of cloud-driven applications, switching, wireless, management and analytics software products with their vertical specific offerings to create compelling information technology solutions for end-user customers. We utilize our field sales organization to support our channel partners and to sell directly to certain end-user customers, including some large global accounts.

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The details of our sales and distribution channels are as follows:

Although we compete in many vertical markets, in fiscal year 2020, we have focused on the specific verticals of healthcare, education, retail, manufacturing, government, sports, and entertainment venues. Years of experience and a track record of success in the verticals we serve enables us to address the following industry-specific problems.

Healthcare:

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Education:

Manufacturing:

Government:

Venues:

Retail:

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Customer Profiles:

Furthermore, in fiscal 2020, we decided to focus on the following customer profiles where we believe we can add the most value:

Customers with 10% of net revenues or greater

See Note 3 of our Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements in this Annual Report on Form 10-K for more information regarding our customers with 10% of net revenues or greater.

International sales

International sales are an important portion of our business. In fiscal 2020, sales to customers outside of the United States accounted for 52% of our consolidated net revenues, compared to 50% in fiscal 2019, and 50% in fiscal 2018. These sales are conducted primarily through foreign-based distributors and resellers managed by our worldwide sales organization. In addition, we have direct sales to end-user customers, including large global accounts.  The primary markets for sales outside of the United States are countries in Europe and Asia, as well as Canada, Mexico, Central America and South America.

We operate in one segment, the development and marketing of network infrastructure equipment. Information concerning revenues, results of operations and revenues by geographic area is set forth under Item 7, “Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.”  Information on risks attendant to our foreign operations is set forth below in Item 1A. “Risk Factors.”

Marketing

We continue to develop and execute a number of marketing programs to support the sale and distribution of our products by communicating the value of our solutions to our existing and potential customers, our distribution channels, our resellers and our technology alliance partners.  Our marketing efforts include participation in industry tradeshows, conferences and seminars, publication of technical and educational articles in industry journals, communication across social media channels, frequent updates to our publicly available website, promotions, web-based training courses, advertising, analyst relations and public relations.  We also submit our products for independent product testing and evaluation.  Extreme participates in numerous industry analyst ratings including Gartner Magic Quadrants, Gartner Critical Capabilities, Gartner Peer Insights, Forrester Waves, IDC MarketScapes and InfoTech Vendor Landscapes.

Backlog

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Our products are often sold on the basis of standard purchase orders that are cancelable prior to shipment without significant penalties. In addition, purchase orders are subject to changes in quantities of products and delivery schedules in order to reflect changes in customer requirements and manufacturing capacity. Our business is characterized by seasonal variability in demand and short lead-time orders and delivery schedules. Actual shipments depend on the then-current capacity of our contract manufacturers and the availability of materials and components from our vendors.  Although we believe the orders included in the backlog are firm, all orders are subject to possible rescheduling by customers, cancellations by customers which we may elect to allow without penalty to customer, and further pricing adjustments on orders from distributors.  Therefore, we do not believe our backlog, as of any particular date is necessarily indicative of actual revenues for any future period.

Our product backlog at June 30, 2020, net of anticipated back end rebates for distributor sales, was $31.7 million, compared to $20.7 million at June 30, 2019.

Seasonality

Like many of our competitors, we historically have experienced seasonal fluctuations in customer spending patterns, which generally adversely affect our first and third fiscal quarters. This pattern should not be relied upon or be considered indicative of our future performance, however, as it has varied in the past.

Customer Service and Support

Our customers seek high reliability and maximum uptime for their networks. To that extent, we provide the following service offerings:

Manufacturing

We utilize a global sourcing strategy that emphasizes procurement of materials and product manufacturing in competitive geographies. We rely upon third-party contract manufactures and (ODM) original design manufacturers (Alpha Networks, Delta Networks Inc, Foxconn, Quanta, Senao Networks, Sercomm Corporation and Wistron NeWeb Corporation) to manufacture, support and ship our products, and therefore are exposed to risks associated with their businesses, financial condition, geographies and geopolitical conflict in which they operate. Our arrangements with these Tier 1 manufacturers generally provide for quality, cost, and delivery requirements, as well as manufacturing process terms, such as continuity of supply; inventory management; flexible capacity, quality, and cost management; oversight of manufacturing; and conditions for use of our intellectual property that allows us to adjust more quickly to changing end-customer demand.  We also leverage and depend on the strong Corporate and Social Responsibility policies and standards of our Tier 1 manufacturers.  The ODM manufacturing process uses automated testing equipment and burn-in procedures, as well as comprehensive inspection, testing, and statistical process controls, which are designed to help ensure the quality and reliability of our products. The manufacturing processes and procedures are generally certified to International Organization for Standardization (“ISO”) 9001 standards. The manufacturing process and material supply chains are flexible enough to be moved to steer away from geopolitical conflicts that impact cost.

We use a collaborative sales and operations planning (“S&OP”) forecast of expected demand based upon historical trends and analyses from our sales and product management functions as adjusted for overall market conditions. We update these forecasts monthly to determine our material requirements.  Our manufacturing partners procure the majority of the components needed to build our products based on our demand forecasts.  This allows us to leverage the purchasing power of our manufacturing partners. Our

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products rely on key components, including merchant silicon, integrated circuit components and power supplies purchased from a limited number of suppliers, including certain sole source providers. Lead times for materials and components vary significantly, and depend on factors such as the specific supplier, complexity, contract terms and demand for a component at a given time. From time to time, we may experience price volatility or supply constraints for certain components that are not available from multiple qualified sources or where our suppliers are geographically concentrated. When necessary, we are often able to obtain scarce components for somewhat higher prices on the open market, which may have an impact on our gross margin, but does not generally disrupt production. We may also acquire component inventory in anticipation of supply constraints or enter into longer-term pricing commitments with vendors to improve the priority, price and availability of supply.  Our product development efforts also depend upon continued collaboration with our key suppliers, including our merchant silicon vendors such as Broadcom. As we develop our product roadmap and continue to expand our relationships with these and other merchant silicon vendors, it is critical that we work in tandem with our key vendors to ensure that their silicon includes improved features and that our products take advantage of such improved features.

We believe our sourcing and manufacturing strategy allows us to conserve capital, lower costs of product revenues, adjust quickly to changes in market demand, and operate without dedicating significant resources to manufacturing-related plant and equipment. As part of our effort to optimize our operations, we continue to focus on driving cost reductions through sourcing, rationalizing our supply chain, outsourcing or virtualizing certain activities, and consolidating distribution sites and service logistics partners. These efforts also include process optimization initiatives, such as vendor managed inventory, and other operational models and strategies designed to drive improved efficiencies in our sourcing, production, logistics and fulfillment.

Research and Development

The success of our products to date is due in large part to our focus on research and development. We believe that continued success in the marketplace will depend on our ability to develop new and enhanced products employing leading-edge technology. Accordingly, we plan to undertake development efforts with an emphasis on increasing the reliability, performance and features of our family of products, and designing innovative products to reduce the overall network operating costs of customers.

Our product development activities focus on solving the needs of customers in the enterprise campus by providing an end-to-end, wired and wireless network solution from the access edge to the private clouds in targeted verticals. Current activities include the continuing development of our innovative switching technology aimed at extending the capabilities of our products. Our ongoing research activities cover a broad range of areas, including, 1G, 2.5G, 5G, 10G, 25G, 40G, 50G and 100G Ethernet, routing, and resiliency protocols, open standards interfaces, software defined networks, network security, identity management, data center fabrics, and wireless networking. In addition, we continue to ramp up our investments in Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence technology targeting Cloud Wi-Fi, IoT anomaly detection, and autonomous networking.

We plan to continue to enhance the functionality of our network operating systems which have been designed to provide high reliability and availability. This allows us to leverage a common operating system across different hardware and network chipsets.

As of June 30, 2020, our research and development organization consisted of 791 employees.  Research and development efforts are conducted in several of our locations, including San Jose, California, Morrisville, North Carolina; Salem, New Hampshire; Toronto, Canada, Shannon, Ireland, and Bangalore and Chennai, India.

Intellectual Property

We rely on a combination of patent, copyright, trademark and trade secret laws and restrictions on disclosure to protect our intellectual property rights.  As of June 30, 2020, we had 707 issued patents in the United States and 419 patents outside of the United States.  The expiration dates of our issued patents in the United States range from 2020 to 2038.  Although we have patent applications pending, there can be no assurance that patents will be issued from pending applications or that claims allowed on any future patents will be sufficiently broad to protect our technology.  As of June 30, 2020, we had 28 registered trademarks in the United States and 248 registered trademarks outside of the United States.

We enter into confidentiality, inventions assignment or license agreements with our employees, consultants and other third parties with whom we do business, and control access to, and distribution of, our software, documentation and other proprietary information.  In addition, we provide our software products to end-user customers primarily under “shrink-wrap” or "click-through" license agreements.  These agreements are not negotiated with or signed by the licensee, and thus these agreements may not be enforceable in some jurisdictions.  Despite our efforts to protect our proprietary rights, unauthorized parties may attempt to copy or otherwise obtain and use our products or technology, particularly in foreign countries where the laws may not protect our proprietary rights as fully as in the United States.

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Competition

The market for network switches, routers and software (including analytics) which is part of the broader market for networking equipment is extremely competitive and characterized by rapid technological progress, frequent new product introductions, changes in customer requirements and evolving industry standards. We believe the principal competitive factors in this market are:

We believe we compete with our competitors with respect to many of the foregoing factors. However, the market for network switching solutions is dominated by a few large companies, particularly Cisco Systems, Inc., Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Co., Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., Arista Networks Inc., Juniper Networks Inc., and Ubiquity Inc. Most of these competitors have longer operating histories, greater name recognition, larger customer bases, broader product lines and substantially greater financial, technical, sales, marketing and other resources.

We expect to face increased competition from both traditional networking solutions companies and Cloud platform companies offering Infrastructure-as-a-Service (“IaaS”) and Platform-as-a-Service (“PaaS”) products to enterprise customers. In that regard, we expect to face increased competition from certain Cloud Computing companies such as Amazon Web Services (“AWS”), Microsoft (“Microsoft Azure”), and Google Inc. (“Google Cloud Platform”) providing a cloud-based platform of data center compute and networking services for enterprise customers.

With the acquisitions of the WLAN, Campus Fabric and Data Center Businesses, and Aerohive, we believe Extreme is uniquely positioned to address the most pressing market needs from the campus to the data center. Although we believe that our solutions and strategy will improve our ability to meet the needs of our current and potential customers, we cannot guarantee future success.

Restructuring and Impairment

Fiscal year 2018

During fiscal 2018, we executed a plan to re-align our resources to take advantage of new growth opportunities as a result of the acquisitions of the Campus Fabric Business and the Data Center Business. The costs associated with this restructuring plan primarily included employee severance and benefits expenses and affected 180 employees.

Fiscal year 2019

On June 25, 2019, we began executing a reduction-in-force plan (the “2019 Plan”) to better align our work force and operating expenses. We incurred charges beginning in the third quarter of fiscal 2019 through the fourth quarter of fiscal 2020, inclusive. Costs associated with the 2019 Plan were primarily comprised of employee severance and benefits expenses and affected 140 employees, relocation of personnel and equipment and exit of excess facilities.

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Fiscal year 2020

During fiscal 2020, we reduced our operating expenses by exiting a floor of our San Jose, California headquarters facility and additional space in our Salem, New Hampshire facility. We continued our initiative to realign our operations resulting from the acquisition of Aerohive and consolidating our workforce and exited the facility we acquired from Aerohive in Milpitas, California.

During the third quarter of fiscal 2020, with the global disruptions and slow-down in the demand of its products caused by the global pandemic outbreak, COVID-19, and the uncertainty around the timing of the recovery of the market, we initiated a reduction-in-force plan (the “2020 Plan”) to reduce our operating costs and enhance financial flexibility. The plan affected approximately 320 employees primarily from the research and development and sales organizations who were located mainly in the United States and India. Costs associated with the 2020 Plan are primarily comprised of employee severance and benefits expenses.

Environmental Matters

We are subject to various environmental and other regulations governing product safety, materials usage, packaging and other environmental impacts in the United States and in various countries where our products are manufactured and sold.  We are also subject to regulatory developments, including recent SEC disclosure regulations relating to so-called "conflict minerals," relating to ethically responsible sourcing of the components and materials used in our products.  To date, compliance with federal, state, local, and foreign laws enacted for the protection of the environment has had no material effect on our capital expenditures, earnings, or competitive position.

We are committed to energy efficiency in our product lines. Accordingly, we believe this is an area that affords us a competitive advantage for our products in the marketplace. We maintain compliance with various regulations related to the environment, including the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment and the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment regulations adopted by the European Union. To date, our compliance efforts with various United States and foreign regulations related to the environment has not had a material effect on our operating results.

Employees

As of June 30, 2020, we employed 2,584 people, including 896 in sales and marketing, 791 in research and development, 315 in operations, 420 in customer support and services and 162 in finance and administration. We have never had a work stoppage and no employees in the United States are represented under a collective bargaining agreement. We consider our employee relations to be good.

We believe our future success depends on our continued ability to attract, integrate, retain, train and motivate highly qualified employees, and upon the continued service of our senior management and key employees.  None of our executive officers or key employees is bound by an employment agreement which mandates that the employee render services for any specific term. The market for qualified personnel is highly competitive.

Organization

We were incorporated in California in May 1996 and reincorporated in Delaware in March 1999. Our corporate headquarters are located at 6480 Via del Oro, San Jose, CA 95119 and our telephone number is (408) 579-2800.  We electronically file our Securities Exchange Commission (“SEC”) disclosure reports with the SEC and they are available free of charge at both www.sec.gov and www.extremenetworks.com.

Our corporate governance guidelines, the charters of our audit committee, our compensation committee, our nominating and corporate governance committee and our code of business conduct and ethics policy (including code of ethics provisions that apply to our principal executive officer, principal financial officer, controller and senior financial officers) are available on the Investors section of our website at investor.extremenetworks.com under “Corporate Governance.” These items are also available to any stockholder who requests them by calling (408) 579-2800.  

Item 1A. Risk Factors

The following is a list of risks and uncertainties which may have a material and adverse effect on our business, operations, industry, financial condition, results of operations or future financial performance. While we believe we have identified and discussed below the key risk factors affecting our business, there may be additional risks and uncertainties that are not presently known or that are not currently believed to be significant that may adversely affect our business, results of operations, industry, financial position and financial performance in the future.  

The coronavirus outbreak has had, and could continue to have, a materially disruptive effect on our business.

A novel strain of coronavirus emerged in December 2019. This coronavirus, now known as COVID-19, has spread around the world and has resulted in authorities implementing numerous measures to try to contain the virus, such as travel bans and restrictions, quarantines, shelter-in-place orders and shutdowns. The spread of COVID-19 has had, and may continue to have, a material negative

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impact on our business, financial condition and results of operations. Current and potential impacts include, but are not limited to, the following:

The global outbreak of COVID-19 continues to rapidly evolve. The extent to which COVID-19 impacts our business will depend on future developments, which are highly uncertain and cannot be predicted with confidence, such as the speed and extent of geographic spread of the disease, the duration of the outbreak, travel restrictions and social distancing in the affected areas, business closures or business disruptions and the effectiveness of actions taken in the affected areas to contain and treat the disease.

We cannot assure future profitability, and our financial results may fluctuate significantly from period to period.

We have reported losses in each of our seven most recent fiscal years. In addition, in years when we reported profits, we were not profitable in each quarter during those years. We anticipate continuing to incur significant sales and marketing, product development and general and administrative expenses. Any delay in generating or recognizing revenue could result in a loss for a quarter or full year.  Even if we are profitable, our operating results may fall below our expectations and those of our investors, which could cause the price of our stock to fall.

We may experience challenges or delays in generating or recognizing revenue for a number of reasons and our revenues and operating results have varied significantly in the past and may vary significantly in the future due to a number of factors, including, but not limited to, the following:

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Due to the foregoing and other factors, many of which are described herein, period-to-period comparisons of our operating results should not be relied upon as an indicator of our future performance.

We may not realize anticipated benefits of past or future acquisitions, divestitures and strategic investments, and the integration of acquired companies or technologies may negatively impact our business, financial condition and results of operations or dilute the ownership interests of our stockholders.

As part of our business strategy, we review acquisition and strategic investment prospects that we believe would complement our current product offerings, augment our market coverage or enhance our technical capabilities, or otherwise offer growth opportunities. In the event of any future acquisitions, we could:

These actions could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, and operating results or the price of our common stock. For example, on August 9, 2019, we completed our acquisition of Aerohive, a publicly held networking company, for $263.6 million in cash consideration and assumption of certain employee equity awards.

There can be no assurance we will achieve the revenues, growth prospects and synergies expected from any acquisition or that we will achieve such revenues, growth prospects and synergies in the anticipated time period and our failure to do so could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and operating results. Moreover, even if we do obtain benefits in the form of increased sales and earnings, these benefits may be recognized much later than the time when the expenses associated with an acquisition are incurred. This is particularly relevant in cases where it would be necessary to integrate new types of technology into our existing portfolio and new types of products may be targeted for potential customers with which we do not have pre-existing relationships.

Our ability to realize the anticipated benefits of any current and future acquisitions, divestitures and investment activities, including the acquisition of Aerohive, also entail numerous risks, including, but not limited to:

In addition, we may not be able to successfully integrate any businesses, products, technologies, or personnel that we might acquire in the future, and our failure to do so could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, and operating results.

The global economic environment has and may continue to negatively impact our business, financial condition and operating results.

The challenges and uncertainty currently affecting global economic conditions, including the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, may negatively impact our business and operating results in the following ways:

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If global economic conditions do not show continued improvement, we believe we could experience material adverse impacts to our business, financial condition and operating results.

Our dependence on a few manufacturers and third parties for our manufacturing, warehousing, and delivery requirements could harm our business, financial condition, and operating results.

We primarily rely on our manufacturing partners: Alpha Networks; Senao Networks; Foxconn; Delta Networks, Wistron NeWeb Corporation, Quanta, and select other partners to manufacture our products. We have experienced delays in product shipments from some of our partners in the past, which in turn delayed product shipments to our customers. These or similar problems may arise in the future, such as delivery of products of inferior quality, delivery of insufficient quantity of products, or the interruption or discontinuance of operations of a manufacturer or other partner, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business and operating results. In addition, any natural disaster, pandemic, or business interruption to our manufacturing partners could significantly disrupt our business. While we maintain strong relationships with our manufacturing and other partners, our agreements with these manufacturers are generally of limited duration and pricing, quality and volume commitments are negotiated on a recurring basis. The failure to maintain continuing agreements with our manufacturing partners or find replacements for them in a timely manner could adversely affect our business.  We intend to introduce new products and product enhancements, which will require that we rapidly achieve volume production by coordinating our efforts with those of our suppliers and contract manufacturers.

As part of our cost-reduction efforts, we will need to realize lower per unit product costs from our manufacturing partners by means of volume efficiencies and the utilization of manufacturing sites in lower-cost geographies. However, we cannot be certain when or if such price reductions will occur. The failure to obtain such price reductions would adversely affect our business, financial condition, and operating results.

In addition, a portion of our manufacturing is performed in China and is therefore subject to risks associated with doing business outside of the United States, including the possibility of additional import tariffs. The United States government has previously announced import tariffs on goods manufactured in China. These tariffs, depending upon their ultimate scope, duration and how they are implemented, could negatively impact our business by continuing to increase our costs and by making our products less competitive. We may not be able to pass such increased costs on to our customers. In addition, any relocation of contract manufacturing facilities to locations outside of China may increase our costs and could impact the global competitiveness of our products.

We depend upon international sales for a significant portion of our revenues which imposes a number of risks on our business.

International sales constitute a significant portion of our net revenues. Our ability to grow will depend in part on the expansion of international sales. Our international sales primarily depend on the success of our resellers and distributors. The failure of these resellers and distributors to sell our products internationally would limit our ability to sustain and grow our revenues. There are a number of risks arising from our international business, including:

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Any or all of these factors could have a material adverse impact on our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Substantially all of our international sales are United States dollar-denominated. The continued strength and future increases in the value of the United States dollar relative to foreign currencies could make our products less competitive in international markets. In the future, we may elect to invoice a larger portion of our international customers in local currency, which would expose us to greater fluctuations in exchange rates between the United States dollar and the particular local currency. If we do so, we may decide to engage in hedging transactions to minimize the risk of such fluctuations.

We have entered into foreign exchange forward contracts to offset the impact of payment of operating expenses in local currencies to some of our operating foreign subsidiaries. However, if we are not successful in managing these foreign currency transactions, we could incur losses from these activities.

Local laws and customs in many countries differ significantly from, or conflict with, those in the United States or in other countries in which we operate. In many foreign countries, it is common for others to engage in business practices that are prohibited by our internal policies and procedures or U.S. regulations applicable to us. Although we have implemented policies, procedures and training designed to ensure compliance with these U.S. and foreign laws and policies, there can be no complete assurance that any individual employee, contractor, channel partner, or agents will not violate our policies and procedures. Violations of laws or key control policies by our employees, contractors, channel partners, or agents could result in termination of our relationship, financial reporting problems, fines, and/or penalties for us, or prohibition on the importation or exportation of our products and could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Over time we expect the average selling price of our products to decrease, which is likely to reduce gross margin and/or revenues.

The network equipment industry has traditionally experienced an erosion of average selling prices due to a number of factors, including competitive pricing pressures, promotional pricing and technological progress. Over time, we anticipate the average selling prices of our products will decrease in the future in response to competitive pricing pressures, excess inventories, increased sales discounts and new product introductions by us or our competitors. We may experience decreases in future operating results due to the erosion of our average selling prices. To maintain our gross margin, we must develop and introduce on a timely basis new products and product enhancements and continually reduce our product costs. Our failure to do so would likely cause our revenues and gross margin to decline.

 We may not fully realize the anticipated positive impacts to future financial results from our restructuring efforts.

We have undertaken restructuring efforts in the past to streamline operations and reduce operating expenses. Our ability to achieve the anticipated cost savings and other benefits from our restructuring efforts within expected time frames is subject to many estimates and assumptions and may vary materially based on factors such as market conditions and the effect of our restructuring efforts on our work force. These estimates and assumptions are subject to significant economic, competitive and other uncertainties, some of which are beyond our control. We cannot assure that we will fully realize the anticipated positive impacts to future financial results from our current or future restructuring efforts. If our estimates and assumptions are incorrect or if other unforeseen events occur, we may not achieve the cost savings expected from such restructurings, and our business, financial condition, and results of operations could be adversely affected.

We purchase several key components for products from single or limited sources and could lose sales if these suppliers fail to meet our needs.

We currently purchase several key components used in the manufacturing of our products from single or limited sources and are dependent upon supply from these sources to meet our needs. Certain components such as tantalum capacitors, SRAM, DRAM, and printed circuit boards, have been in the past, and may in the future be, in short supply. We have encountered, and are likely in the future to encounter, shortages and delays in obtaining these or other components, and this could have a material adverse effect on our ability to meet customer orders. Our principal sole-source components include:

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Our principal limited-source components include:

We use our forecast of expected demand to determine our material requirements. Lead times for materials and components we order vary significantly, and depend on factors such as the specific supplier, contract terms and demand for a component at a given time. If forecasts exceed orders, we may have excess and/or obsolete inventory, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition. If orders exceed forecasts, we may have inadequate supplies of certain materials and components, which could have a material adverse effect on our ability to meet customer delivery requirements and to recognize revenue.

Our top ten suppliers accounted for a significant portion of our purchases during the year. Given the significant concentration of our supply chain, particularly with certain sole or limited source providers, any significant interruption by any of the key suppliers or a termination of a relationship could temporarily disrupt our operations.  Additionally, our operations are materially dependent upon the continued market acceptance and quality of these manufacturers’ products and their ability to continue to manufacture products that are competitive and that comply with laws relating to environmental and efficiency standards. Our inability to obtain products from one or more of these suppliers or a decline in market acceptance of these suppliers’ products could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations and financial condition. Other than pursuant to an agreement with a key component supplier which includes pricing based on a minimum volume commitment, generally we do not have agreements fixing long-term prices or minimum volume requirements from suppliers. From time to time we have experienced shortages and allocations of certain components, resulting in delays in filling orders. Qualifying new suppliers to compensate for such shortages may be time-consuming and costly and may increase the likelihood of errors in design or production. In addition, during the development of our products, we have experienced delays in the prototyping of our chipsets, which in turn has led to delays in product introductions. Similar delays may occur in the future. Furthermore, the performance of the components from our suppliers as incorporated in our products may not meet the quality requirements of our customers.

The extended factory closures in China and Mexico and the disruption of distribution facilities in El Paso, Texas in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak reduced the capacity of our supply chain and may continue to do so. See also, Item 1A. Risk Factors—“The coronavirus outbreak has had, and could continue to have, a materially disruptive effect on our business.”

To successfully manage our business or achieve our goals, we must attract, retain, train, motivate, develop and promote key employees, and a failure to do so can harm us.

Our success depends to a significant degree upon the continued contributions of our key management, engineering, sales and marketing, service and operations personnel, many of whom would be difficult to replace. We have experienced and may in the future experience significant turnover in our executive personnel.  Changes in our management and key employees could affect our financial results, and our prior reductions in force may impede our ability to attract and retain highly skilled personnel.  We believe our future success will also depend in large part upon our ability to attract and retain highly skilled managerial, engineering, sales and marketing, service, finance and operations personnel.  The market for such personnel is competitive in certain regions for certain types of technical skills.

A number of our employees are foreign nationals who rely on visas and entry permits in order to legally work in the United States and other countries.  In recent years, the United States has increased the level of scrutiny in granting H-1B, L-1 and other business visas.  In addition, the current U.S. administration has indicated that immigration reform is a priority. Compliance with United States immigration and labor laws could require us to incur additional unexpected labor costs and expenses or could restrain our ability to retain skilled professionals.  Any of these restrictions could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations and financial conditions.

Our stock price has been volatile in the past and may significantly fluctuate in the future.

In the past, our common stock price has fluctuated significantly. This could continue as we or our competitors announce new products, our results or those of our customers or competition fluctuate, conditions in the networking or semiconductor industry change, conditions in the global economy change, particularly in light of the COVID-19 impact, or when investors change their sentiment toward stocks in the networking technology sector.

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In addition, fluctuations in our stock price and our enterprise value to sales valuation may make our stock attractive to momentum, hedge or day-trading investors who often shift funds into and out of stock rapidly, exacerbating price fluctuations in either direction, particularly when viewed on a quarterly basis.  These fluctuations may adversely affect the trading price or liquidity of our common stock. Some companies, including us, that have had volatile market prices for their securities have had securities class action lawsuits filed against them. If a suit were filed against us, regardless of its merits or outcome, it could result in substantial costs and divert management’s attention and resources.  

Intense competition in the market for networking equipment and cloud platform companies could prevent us from increasing revenues and attaining profitability.

The market for network switching solutions is intensely competitive and dominated primarily by Cisco Systems Inc., Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company, Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., Arista Networks, Inc., Juniper Networks, and Ubiquiti Inc. Most of our competitors have longer operating histories, greater name recognition, larger customer bases, broader product lines and substantially greater financial, technical, sales, marketing and other resources. As a result, these competitors are able to devote greater resources to the development, promotion, sale and support of their products. In addition, they have larger distribution channels, stronger brand names, access to more customers, a larger installed customer base and a greater ability to make attractive offers to channel partners and customers than we do. Further, many of our competitors have made substantial investments in hardware networking capabilities and offerings.  These competitors may be able to gain market share by leveraging their investments in hardware networking capabilities to attract customers at lower prices or with greater synergies. Some of our customers may question whether we have the financial resources to complete their projects and future service commitments.

We may also face increased competition from both traditional networking solutions companies and cloud platform companies offering IaaS and PaaS products to enterprise customers. In particular, AWS, Microsoft Azure, and the Google Cloud Platform may provide enterprise customers with a cloud-based platform of data center computing and networking services.

For example, we have encountered, and expect to continue to encounter in the future, many potential customers who are confident in and committed to the product offerings of our principal competitors. Accordingly, these potential customers may not consider or evaluate our products. When such potential customers have considered or evaluated our products, we have in the past lost, and expect in the future to lose, sales to some of these customers as large competitors have offered significant price discounts to secure these sales.

The pricing policies of our competitors impact the overall demand for our products and services. Some of our competitors are capable of operating at significant losses for extended periods of time, increasing pricing pressure on our products and services. If we do not maintain competitive pricing, the demand for our products and services, as well as our market share, may decline. From time to time, we may lower the prices of our products and services in response to competitive pressure. When this happens, if we are unable to reduce our component costs or improve operating efficiencies, our revenues and gross margins will be adversely affected.

Industry consolidation may lead to stronger competition and may harm our business, financial condition, and operating results.

There has been a trend toward industry consolidation in our markets for several years. We expect this trend to continue as companies attempt to strengthen or hold their market positions in an evolving industry and as companies are acquired or are unable to continue operations. For example, some of our current and potential competitors for enterprise data center and wireless LAN business have made acquisitions or announced new strategic alliances, designed to position them with the ability to provide end-to-end technology solutions for the enterprise. Companies that are strategic alliance partners in some areas of our business may acquire or form alliances with our competitors, thereby reducing their business with us. We believe industry consolidation may result in stronger competitors that are better able to compete as sole-source vendors for customers. This could lead to more variability in our operating results and could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition. Furthermore, particularly in the service provider market, rapid consolidation will lead to fewer customers, with the effect that loss of a major customer could have a material impact on results not anticipated in a customer marketplace composed of more numerous participants.

We intend to invest in engineering, sales, services, marketing and manufacturing on a long-term basis, and delays or inability to attain the expected benefits may result in unfavorable operating results.

While we intend to focus on managing our costs and expenses, over the long term, we also intend to invest in personnel and other resources related to our engineering, sales, services, marketing and manufacturing functions as we focus on our foundational priorities, such as leadership in our core products and solutions and architectures for business transformation. We are likely to recognize the costs associated with these investments earlier than some of the anticipated benefits and the return on these investments may be lower, or may develop more slowly, than we expect. If we do not achieve the benefits anticipated from these investments, or if the achievement of these benefits is delayed, our business, financial condition, and operating results may be adversely affected.

Our success is dependent on our ability to continually introduce new products and features that achieve broad market acceptance.

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The network equipment market is characterized by rapid technological progress, frequent new product introductions, changes in customer requirements and evolving industry standards. If we do not regularly introduce new products in this dynamic environment, our product lines will become obsolete. These new products must be compatible and inter-operate with products and architectures offered by other vendors. We have and may in the future experience delays in product development and releases, and such delays have and could in the future adversely affect our ability to compete and our business, financial condition, and operating results.

When we announce new products or product enhancements that have the potential to replace or shorten the life cycle of our existing products, customers may defer or cancel orders for our existing products; in addition, ending sales of existing products may cause customers to cancel or defer orders for our existing products. These actions could have a material adverse effect on our operating results by unexpectedly decreasing sales, increasing inventory levels of older products and exposing us to greater risk of product obsolescence.

If we do not successfully anticipate technological shifts, market needs and opportunities, and develop products, product enhancements and business strategies that meet those technological shifts, needs and opportunities, or if those products are not made available or strategies are not executed in a timely manner or do not gain market acceptance, we may not be able to compete effectively and our ability to generate revenues will suffer.

The markets for our products are constantly evolving and characterized by rapid technological change, frequent product introductions, changes in customer requirements, and continuous pricing pressures. We cannot guarantee that we will be able to anticipate future technological shifts, market needs and opportunities or be able to develop new products, product enhancements and business strategies to meet such technological shifts, needs or opportunities in a timely manner or at all. For example, the move from Wi-Fi 5 to Wi-Fi 6 infrastructures has been receiving considerable attention. In our view, it will take several years to see the majority of customers fully embrace Wi-Fi 6 technology, and we believe the successful Wi-Fi 6 products and solutions will combine hardware, software, cloud, machine learning, and artificial intelligence elements together to provide value in addition to the chipset evolution itself. If we fail to anticipate market requirements or opportunities or fail to develop and introduce new products, product enhancements or business strategies to meet those requirements or opportunities in a timely manner, it could cause us to lose customers, and such failure could substantially decrease or delay market acceptance and sales of our present and future products and services, which would significantly harm our business, financial condition, and results of operations. Even if we are able to anticipate, develop and commercially introduce new products and enhancements, we cannot assure that new products or enhancements will achieve widespread market acceptance.

Our employees may engage in misconduct or other improper activities, including noncompliance with regulatory standards and requirements, which could have a material adverse effect on our business.

We are exposed to the risk of employee fraud or other misconduct. Misconduct by employees could include intentional failures to: 

The precautions we take to detect and prevent misconduct may not be effective in controlling unknown or unmanaged risks or losses or in protecting us from governmental investigations or other actions or lawsuits stemming from a failure to be in compliance with such laws or regulations. If any such actions are instituted against us, and we are not successful in defending ourselves or asserting our rights, those actions could have a significant impact on our business, financial condition, and results of operations, including the imposition of significant fines or other sanctions.

The cloud networking market is still in its early stages and is rapidly evolving. If this market does not evolve as we anticipate, our target end customers do not adopt our cloud networking solutions, or we are unable to effectively transition to a cloud-based model, we may not be able to compete effectively, and our ability to generate revenues will suffer.

The cloud networking market is the fastest growing segment of the networking industry, estimated at $2 billion in revenue, according to IHS Markit, with expected compound annual growth rates more than double that of on-premises managed networking, and this projected data led us to acquire Aerohive Networks, Inc. in August 2019. The market demand for cloud networking solutions has increased in recent years as end customers have deployed larger networks and have increased the use of virtualization and cloud computing. Our success may be impacted by our ability to provide successful cloud networking solutions that address the needs of our channel partners and end customers more effectively and economically than those of other competitors or existing technologies.  If the cloud networking solutions market does not develop in the way we anticipate, if our solutions do not offer significant benefits compared to competing legacy network switching products, if end customers do not recognize the benefits that our solutions provide,

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or we are unable to successfully pivot our business to a cloud-based model, then our potential for growth in this cloud market could be adversely affected.  In addition, if the transition to cloud takes a significant amount of time, we run the risk of affecting our current core revenue streams.

Claims of infringement by others may increase and the resolution of such claims may adversely affect our business, financial condition, and operating results.

Our industry is characterized by the existence of a large number of patents and frequent claims and related litigation regarding patents, copyrights (including rights to “open source” software) and other intellectual property rights. As we have grown it has, and may continue to, experience greater revenues and increased public visibility, which may cause competitors, customers, and governmental authorities to be more likely to initiate litigation against us. Because of the existence of a large number of patents in the networking field, the secrecy of some pending patents and the issuance of new patents at a rapid pace, it is not possible to determine in advance if a product or component might infringe the patent rights of others. Because of the potential for courts awarding substantial damages, or internationally prohibiting us from exporting, in the case of China, or importing our products, in the case of Germany, the lack of predictability of such awards and the high legal costs associated with the defense of such patent infringement matters that would be expended to prove lack of infringement, it is not uncommon for companies in our industry to settle even potentially unmeritorious claims for very substantial amounts. Furthermore, the entities with whom we have or could have disputes or discussions include entities with extensive patent portfolios and substantial financial assets. These entities are actively engaged in programs to generate substantial revenues from their patent portfolios and are seeking or may seek significant payments or royalties from us and others in our industry.

Litigation resulting from claims that we are infringing the proprietary rights of others has resulted and could in the future result in substantial costs and a diversion of resources and could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. We previously received notices from entities alleging that we were infringing their patents and have been party to patent litigation in the past.

Without regard to the merits of these or any other claims, an adverse court order or a settlement could require us, among other actions, to:

In addition, our products include so-called “open source” software. Open source software is typically licensed for use at no initial charge but imposes on the user of the open source software certain requirements to license to others both the open source software as well as modifications to the open source software under certain circumstances. Our use of open source software subjects us to certain additional risks for the following reasons:

We believe even if we do not infringe the rights of others, we will incur significant expenses in the future due to defense of legal claims, disputes or licensing negotiations, though the amounts cannot be determined. These expenses may be material or otherwise adversely affect our business, financial condition, and operating results.

Our credit facilities impose financial and operating restrictions on us.

Our 2019 Credit Agreement imposes, and the terms of any future debt may impose, operating and other restrictions on us. These restrictions could affect, and in many respects limit or prohibit, among other items, our ability to:

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Our 2019 Credit Agreement also requires us to achieve and maintain compliance with specified financial ratios and certain liquidity and revenue metrics. A breach of any of these restrictive covenants or the inability to comply with the required financial ratios or metrics could result in a default under our 2019 Credit Agreement. For example, in May 2020, we obtained a limited waiver under the 2019 Credit Agreement relating to compliance with certain financial metrics. If we are unable to remain in compliance with these more restrictive covenants during the waiver period, or if any further event of default occurs, the lenders under our 2019 Credit Agreement may elect to declare all outstanding borrowings, together with accrued interest and other fees, to be immediately due and payable. The lenders under our 2019 Credit Agreement also have the right in these circumstances to terminate any commitments they have to provide further borrowings.

Uncertainty about the future of the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) could impact the cost of our borrowing and ability to mitigate interest rate risk.

Certain of our financing instruments involve variable rate debt, thus exposing us to the risk of fluctuations in interest rates. Our 2019 Credit Agreement provides for interest to be calculated based on the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”), however, the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority, which regulates LIBOR, announced in 2017 that it intends to phase out LIBOR by the end of 2021. With the expected discontinuation of LIBOR, the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun publishing a Secured Overnight Funding Rate, an index based on transactions in the Treasury repurchase market. At this time, we cannot predict how markets will respond to this or other proposed alternative rates or the effect of any changes to LIBOR or the discontinuation of LIBOR. The overall financial market may be disrupted as a result of the phase-out or replacement of LIBOR, which could increase our cost of borrowing and could impact our ability to enter into hedging arrangements to mitigate interest rate risk.  If LIBOR is no longer available or if our lenders have increased costs due to changes in LIBOR, we may experience potential increases in interest rates on our variable rate debt, which could adversely impact our interest expense, results of operations and cash flows.  

If we fail to meet our payment or other obligations under our 2019 Credit Agreement, the lenders under such 2019 Credit Agreement, as amended, could foreclose on, and acquire control of, substantially all of our assets.

Our 2019 Credit Agreement is jointly and severally guaranteed by us and certain of our subsidiaries. Borrowings under our 2019 Credit Agreement are secured by liens on substantially all of our assets, including the capital stock of certain of our subsidiaries, and the assets of our subsidiaries that are loan party guarantors. If we are unable to repay outstanding borrowings when due or comply with other obligations and covenants under our 2019 Credit Agreement, the lenders under our 2019 Credit Agreement will have the right to proceed against these pledged capital stock and take control of substantially all of our assets.

Our cash requirements may require us to seek additional debt or equity financing and we may not be able to obtain such financing on favorable terms, or at all.

Our 2019 Credit Agreement may not be sufficient for our future working capital, investments and cash requirements, in which case we would need to seek additional debt or equity financing or scale back our operations. In addition, we may need to seek additional financing to achieve and maintain compliance with specified financial ratios under our 2019 Credit Agreement, as amended.  We may not be able to access additional capital resources due to a variety of reasons, including the restrictive covenants in our 2019 Credit Agreement and the lack of available capital due to global economic conditions. If our financing requirements are not met and we are unable to access additional financing on favorable terms, or at all, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be materially adversely affected.

We are exposed to the credit risk of our channel partners and some of our end customers, which could result in material losses.    

Most of our sales are on an open credit basis, with standard payment terms of 30 days in the United States and, because of local customs or conditions, longer in some markets outside the U.S. We monitor individual end-customer payment capability in granting such open credit arrangements, seek to limit such open credit to amounts we believe the end customers can pay and maintain reserves we believe are adequate to cover exposure for doubtful accounts.  Any significant delay or default in the collection of significant accounts receivable could potentially result in an increased need for us to obtain working capital from other sources, possibly on worse terms than we could have negotiated if we had established such working capital resources prior to such delays or defaults. Any significant default could adversely affect our results of operations and delay our ability to recognize revenue.

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A material portion of our sales is derived through our distributors, systems integrators and value-added resellers. Some of our distributors, systems integrators and value-added resellers may experience financial difficulties, which could adversely affect our collection of accounts receivable. Our exposure to credit risks of our channel partners may increase if our channel partners and their end customers are adversely affected by global or regional economic conditions. One or more of these channel partners could delay payments or default on credit extended to them, either of which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.

Our operating results may be negatively affected by legal proceedings.

We have in the past, currently are and will likely in the future pursue or be subject to claims or lawsuits in the normal course of our business. In addition to the risks related to the intellectual property lawsuits described above, we are currently parties to other litigation as described in Note 10 to our Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements included elsewhere in this Report. Regardless of the result, litigation can be expensive, lengthy and disruptive to normal business operations. Moreover, the results of complex legal proceedings are difficult to predict. An unfavorable resolution of a lawsuit in which we are a defendant could result in a court order against us or payments to other parties that would have an adverse effect on our business, results of operations or financial condition. Even if we are successful in prosecuting claims and lawsuits, we may not recover damages sufficient to cover our expenses incurred to manage, investigate and pursue the litigation. In addition, subject to certain limitations, we may be obligated to indemnify our current and former customers, suppliers, directors, officers and employees in certain lawsuits. We may not have adequate insurance coverage to cover all of our litigation costs and liabilities.

Failure to protect our intellectual property could affect our business.

We rely on a combination of patent, copyright, trademark and trade secret laws and restrictions on disclosure to protect our intellectual property rights. However, we cannot ensure that the actions we have taken will adequately protect our intellectual property rights or that other parties will not independently develop similar or competing products that do not infringe on our patents. We generally enter into confidentiality, invention assignment or license agreements with our employees, consultants and other third parties with whom we do business, and control access to and distribution of our intellectual property and other proprietary information. Despite our efforts to protect our proprietary rights, unauthorized parties may attempt to copy or otherwise misappropriate or use our products or technology, which would adversely affect our business.

When our products contain undetected errors, we may incur significant unexpected expenses and could lose sales.

Network products frequently contain undetected errors when new products or new versions or updates of existing products are released to the marketplace. In the past, we have experienced such errors in connection with new products and product updates. We have experienced component problems in prior years that caused us to incur higher than expected warranty, service costs and expenses, and other related operating expenses. In the future, we expect that, from time to time, such errors or component failures will be found in new or existing products after the commencement of commercial shipments. These problems may have a material adverse effect on our business by causing us to incur significant warranty, repair and replacement costs, diverting the attention of our engineering personnel from new product development efforts, delaying the recognition of revenue and causing significant customer relations problems. Further, if products are not accepted by customers due to such defects, and such returns exceed the amount we accrued for defective returns based on our historical experience, our business, financial condition, and results of operations would be adversely affected.

Our products must successfully inter-operate with products from other vendors. As a result, when problems occur in a network, it may be difficult to identify the sources of these problems. The occurrence of system errors, whether or not caused by our products, could result in the delay or loss of market acceptance of our products and any necessary revisions may cause us to incur significant expenses. The occurrence of any such problems would likely have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition.

We must continue to develop and increase the productivity of our indirect distribution channels to increase net revenues and improve our operating results.

Our distribution strategy focuses primarily on developing and increasing the productivity of our indirect distribution channels. If we fail to develop and cultivate relationships with significant channel partners, or if these channel partners are not successful in their sales efforts, sales of our products may decrease and our operating results could suffer. Many of our channel partners also sell products from other vendors that compete with our products. Our channel partners may not continue to market or sell our products effectively or to devote the resources necessary to provide us with effective sales, marketing and technical support. We may not be able to successfully manage our sales channels or enter into additional reseller and/or distribution agreements. Our failure to do any of these could limit our ability to grow or sustain revenues.

Our operating results for any given period have and will continue to depend to a significant extent on large orders from a relatively small number of channel partners and other customers. However, we do not have binding purchase commitments from any of them. A substantial reduction or delay in sales of our products to a significant reseller, distributor or other customer could harm our business, operating results and financial condition because our expense levels are based on our expectations as to future revenues and

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to a large extent are fixed in the short term. Under specified conditions, some third-party distributors are allowed to return products to us and unexpected returns could adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Our channel partners and other indirect distribution channels have been negatively impacted by COVID-19 and the resulting economic decline and may continue to be so impacted.  This has resulted in, and may continue to result in, decreased sales.

The sales cycle for our products is long and we may incur substantial non-recoverable expenses or devote significant resources to sales that do not occur when anticipated.

The purchase of our products represents a significant strategic decision by a customer regarding its communications infrastructure. The decision by customers to purchase our products is often based on the results of a variety of internal procedures associated with the evaluation, testing, implementation and acceptance of new technologies. Accordingly, the product evaluation process frequently results in a lengthy sales cycle, typically ranging from three months to longer than a year, and as a result, our ability to sell products is subject to a number of significant risks, including risks that:

Failure to successfully optimize our sales and support teams or educate them in regard to technologies and our product families may harm our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

The sale of our products and services requires a concerted effort that is frequently targeted at several levels within a prospective customer's organization. We may not be able to increase net revenues unless we optimize our sales and support teams in order to address all of the customer requirements necessary to sell our products.

We cannot assure that we will be able to successfully integrate employees into our Company or to educate and train current and future employees in regard to rapidly evolving technologies and our product families. A failure to do so may hurt our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Failure of our products to comply with evolving industry standards and complex government regulations may adversely impact our business.

If we do not comply with existing or evolving industry standards and government regulations, we may not be able to sell our products where these standards or regulations apply. The network equipment industry in which we compete is characterized by rapid changes in technology and customers' requirements and evolving industry standards. As a result, our success depends on:

In the past, we have introduced new products that were not compatible with certain technological standards, and in the future, we may not be able to effectively address the compatibility and interoperability issues that arise as a result of technological changes and evolving industry standards.

Our products must also comply with various U.S. federal government regulations and standards defined by agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission, standards established by governmental authorities in various foreign countries and recommendations of the International Telecommunication Union. In some circumstances, we must obtain regulatory approvals or certificates of compliance before we can offer or distribute our products in certain jurisdictions or to certain customers. Complying with new regulations or obtaining certifications can be costly and disruptive to our business.

If we do not comply with existing or evolving industry standards or government regulations, we will not be able to sell our products where these standards or regulations apply, which may prevent us from sustaining our net revenues or achieving profitability.

 If we do not adequately manage and evolve our financial reporting and managerial systems and processes, our ability to manage and grow our business may be harmed.

Our ability to successfully implement our business plan and comply with regulations requires an effective planning and management process. We need to ensure that any businesses acquired, including Aerohive, are appropriately integrated in our financial systems. We need to continue improving our existing, and implement new, operational and financial systems, procedures and

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controls.  Any delay in the implementation of, or disruption in the integration of acquired businesses, or delay and disruption in the transition to, new or enhanced systems, procedures or controls, could harm our ability to record and report financial and management information on a timely and accurate basis, or to forecast future results.

Our provision for income taxes and overall cash tax costs are affected by a number of factors, including reorganizations or restructurings of our business, jurisdictional revenue mix and changes in tax regulations or policy including recent U.S. tax legislation, all of which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

We are a multinational company subject to income tax as well as non-income-based taxes in various tax jurisdictions.  Significant judgment is required to determine our worldwide provision for income taxes.  In the ordinary course of business, there are many transactions where the ultimate tax determination is uncertain.  Additionally, our calculations of income taxes payable currently and on a deferred basis are based on our interpretation of applicable tax laws in the jurisdictions in which we are required to file tax returns.

U.S. tax legislation has significantly changed the U.S. federal income taxation of U.S. corporations, including by reducing the U.S. corporate income tax rate, limiting interest deductions, permitting immediate expensing of certain capital expenditures, adopting elements of a territorial tax system, imposing a one-time transition tax (or “repatriation tax”) on all undistributed earnings and profits of certain U.S.-owned foreign corporations, revising the rules governing net operating losses and the rules governing foreign tax credits, and introducing new anti-base erosion provisions. Many of these changes were effective immediately upon enactment on December 22, 2017, without any transition periods or grandfathering for existing transactions. The legislation remains somewhat unclear in certain respects and could be subject to potential amendments and technical corrections, as well as interpretations and implementing regulations by the Treasury and Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”), any of which could lessen or increase certain adverse impacts of the legislation.

Our analysis and interpretation of this legislation was completed in the second quarter of the fiscal year ended June 30, 2019, and based on our determination, the reduction of the U.S. corporate income tax rate did not have a materially adverse impact to our earnings given our U.S. valuation allowance. We determined the one-time transition tax did not have a materially adverse impact given our ability to utilize existing tax attributes. An estimate of the impact was recorded in the second quarter of the fiscal year ended June 30, 2018, and a final adjustment to the estimate was recorded in the second quarter of fiscal year ended June 30, 2019 as allowed under the relevant accounting guidance issued by the SEC. We believe the limitation on interest deductions, the expanded limitation on executive compensation deductions and the anti-base erosion provisions in the legislation may negatively impact our cash flows going forward.  There may be other material adverse effects resulting from the legislation that we have not yet identified.

We have adopted transfer pricing policies between our affiliated entities.  Our taxable income in any jurisdiction is dependent upon acceptance of our operational practices and intercompany transfer pricing by local tax authorities as being on an arm’s length basis.  Due to inconsistencies in application of the arm’s length standard among tax authorities, as well as lack of comprehensive treaty-based protection, transfer pricing challenges by tax authorities could, if successful result in adjustments to prior or future years.  As a result of these adjustments, we could become subject to higher taxes and our earnings and results of operations could be adversely affected in any period in which such determination is made.

Although we believe our tax estimates are reasonable, there is no assurance that the final determination of our income tax liability will not be materially different than what is reflected in our income tax provisions and accruals.  Significant judgment is required to determine the recognition and measurement of tax liabilities prescribed in the relevant accounting guidance for uncertainty in income taxes.  The accounting guidance for uncertainty in income taxes applies to all income tax positions, which, if resolved unfavorably, could adversely impact our provision for income taxes and our payment obligation with respect to any such taxes.

Changes in the effective tax rate including from the release of the valuation allowance recorded against our net U.S. deferred tax assets, or adverse outcomes resulting from examination of our income or other tax returns or a change in ownership, could adversely affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Our future effective tax rates may be volatile or adversely affected by changes in our business or U.S. or foreign tax laws, including: the partial or full release of the valuation allowances recorded against our net U.S. and Irish deferred tax assets; expiration of or lapses in the research and development tax credit laws; transfer pricing adjustments; tax effects of stock-based compensation; or costs related to restructuring. In addition, we are subject to the examination of our income tax returns by the Internal Revenue Service, Irish Revenue, and other tax authorities globally. Although we regularly assess the likelihood of adverse outcomes resulting from these examinations to determine the adequacy of our provision for income taxes, there is no assurance that such determinations by us are in fact adequate. Changes in our effective tax rates or amounts assessed upon examination of our tax returns may have a material, adverse impact on our business, financial condition, and results of operations.

Our future effective tax rate in particular could be adversely affected by a change in ownership pursuant to Section 382 of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code. If a change in ownership occurs, it may limit our ability to utilize our net operating losses to offset our U.S. taxable income. If U.S. taxable income is greater than the change in ownership limitation, we may pay cash tax based on the amount of taxable income that exceeds the limitation after application of any available tax credits. This could have a material adverse

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impact on our results of operations. On April 26, 2012, we adopted the Restated Rights Plan to help protect our assets. In general, this does not allow a stockholder to acquire more than 4.95% of our outstanding common stock without a waiver from our Board, who must take into account the relevant tax analysis relating to potential limitation of our net operating losses. Our Restated Rights Plan is effective through May 31, 2021.

 Provisions in our charter documents and Delaware law and our adoption of a stockholder rights plan may delay or prevent an acquisition of Extreme, which could decrease the value of our common stock.

Our certificate of incorporation and bylaws and Delaware law contain provisions that could make it more difficult for a third party to acquire us without the consent of our Board. Delaware law also imposes some restrictions on mergers and other business combinations between us and any holder of 15% or more of our outstanding common stock. In addition, our Board has the right to issue preferred stock without stockholder approval, which could be used to dilute the stock ownership of a potential hostile acquirer. Although we believe these provisions of our certificate of incorporation and bylaws and Delaware law will provide for an opportunity to receive a higher bid by requiring potential acquirers to negotiate with our Board, these provisions apply even if the offer may be considered beneficial by some of our stockholders.

Our bylaws, as amended, provide that, unless we consent in writing to an alternative forum, the Court of Chancery of the State of Delaware is the exclusive forum for any derivative action or proceeding brought on our behalf, any action asserting a breach of a fiduciary duty owed by any of our directors, officers, or other employees to us, any action asserting a claim against us arising pursuant to the Delaware General Corporation Law, our certificate of incorporation or our bylaws, any action to interpret, apply, enforce, or determine the validity of our certificate of incorporation or bylaws, or any action asserting a claim against us that is governed by the internal affairs doctrine. The choice of forum provision 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 such lawsuits against us and our directors, officers and other employees.

Our Restated Rights Plan provides that if a single stockholder (or group) acquires more than 4.95% of our outstanding common stock without a waiver from our Board, each holder of one share of our common stock (other than the stockholder or group who acquired in excess of 4.95% of our common stock) may purchase a fractional share of our preferred stock that would result in substantial dilution to the triggering stockholder or group. Accordingly, although this plan is designed to prevent any limitation on the utilization of our net operating losses by avoiding issues raised under Section 382 of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code, the Restated Rights Plan could also serve as a deterrent to stockholders wishing to effect a change of control.

Compliance with laws, rules and regulations relating to corporate governance and public disclosure may result in additional expenses.

Federal securities laws, rules and regulations, as well as NASDAQ rules and regulations, require companies to maintain extensive corporate governance measures, impose comprehensive reporting and disclosure requirements, set strict independence and financial expertise standards for audit and other committee members and impose civil and criminal penalties for companies and their Chief Executive Officers, Chief Financial Officers and directors for securities law violations. These laws, rules and regulations and the interpretation of these requirements are evolving, and we are making investments to evaluate current practices and to continue to achieve compliance, which investments may have a material impact on our financial condition.

We are required to evaluate the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting on an annual basis and publicly disclose any material weaknesses in our controls.  Any adverse results from such evaluation could result in a loss of investor confidence in our financial reports and significant expense to remediate, and ultimately could have an adverse effect on our stock price.

Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 requires our management to assess the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting and to disclose if such controls were unable to provide assurance that a material error would be prevented or detected in a timely manner. We have an ongoing program to review the design of our internal controls framework in keeping with changes in business needs, implement necessary changes to our controls design and test the system and process controls necessary to comply with these requirements. Because of the inherent limitations in all control systems, no evaluation of controls can provide absolute assurance that misstatements due to error or fraud will not occur or that all control issues and instances of fraud, if any, within our Company will have been detected.

If we or our independent registered public accounting firm identifies material weaknesses in our internal controls, the disclosure of that fact, even if quickly remedied, may cause investors to lose confidence in our financial statements and its stock price may decline. Remediation of a material weakness could require us to incur significant expenses and, if we fail to remedy any material weakness, our ability to report our financial results on a timely and accurate basis may be adversely affected, our access to the capital markets may be restricted, our stock price may decline, and we may be subject to sanctions or investigation by regulatory authorities, including the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission or NASDAQ. We may also be required to restate our financial statements from prior periods. Execution of restatements create a significant strain on our internal resources and could cause delays in our filing

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of quarterly or annual financial results, increase our costs and cause management distraction. Restatements may also significantly affect our stock price in an adverse manner.

We rely on the availability of third-party licenses.

Some of our products are designed to include software or other intellectual property, including open source software, licensed from third parties. It may be necessary in the future to seek or renew licenses relating to various aspects of these products. There can be no assurance that the necessary licenses would be available on acceptable terms, if at all. The inability to obtain certain licenses or other rights or to obtain such licenses or rights on favorable terms, could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results, and financial condition. Moreover, the inclusion in our products of software or other intellectual property licensed from third parties on a nonexclusive basis could limit our ability to protect our proprietary rights in our products.  Further, the failure to comply with the terms of any license, including free open source software, may result in our inability to continue to use such license.

We rely on third-party providers such as Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform for services needed to deliver our cloud solutions and other third-party providers for our internal operations. Any disruption in the services provided by such third-party providers could adversely affect our business and subject us to liability.

Our cloud solutions are hosted from and use computing infrastructure provided by third parties, including Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, and Microsoft Azure.  We do not own or control the operation of the third-party facilities or equipment used to provide the cloud services. Our computing infrastructure service providers have no obligation to renew their agreements with us on commercially reasonable terms or at all. If we are unable to renew these agreements on commercially reasonable terms, or if one of our computing infrastructure service providers is acquired, we may be required to transition to a new provider and we may incur significant costs and possible service interruption in connection with doing so. In addition, such service providers could decide to close their facilities or change or suspend their service offerings without adequate notice to us. Moreover, any financial difficulties, such as bankruptcy, faced by such service providers may have negative effects on our business, the nature and extent of which are difficult to predict.

If these third-party service providers experience service outages, performance problems or errors, this could adversely affect the experience of our customers.  Our agreements with third-party computing infrastructure service providers may not entitle us to corresponding service level credits to those we offer to our customers. Any changes in third-party service levels at our computing infrastructure service providers or any related disruptions or performance problems with our solutions could adversely affect our reputation and impact our customers’ operations, result in lengthy interruptions in our services, or result in potential losses of customer data. Interruptions in our services might reduce our revenues, cause us to issue refunds to customers for prepaid and unused subscriptions, subject us to service level credit claims and potential liability, or adversely affect our renewal rates.

Additionally, if a third-party service provider fails to maintain compliance with standards such as SOC2 or ISO27001, it could affect the underlying controls that we maintain, or that our customers rely upon.  This could entail additional costs to compensate for the lost controls, or have a negative impact on revenue.

We rely on third-party cloud service providers such as salesforce.com and Oracle to support internal operations.  Disruptions to such service or data breaches of those services could impact our ability to maintain efficient operations and to provide services to our customers.

System security risks, data breaches, and cyber-attacks could compromise our proprietary information, disrupt our internal operations and harm public perception of our products, which could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

In the ordinary course of business, we store sensitive data, including intellectual property, our proprietary business information and that of our customers, suppliers and business partners on our networks. In addition, we store sensitive or classified information through cloud-based services that may be hosted by third parties and in data center infrastructure maintained by third parties. The secure maintenance of this information is critical to our operations and business strategy. Increasingly, companies, including us, are subject to a wide variety of attacks on their networks and/or cloud-based services on an ongoing basis. Despite our security measures, our information technology and infrastructure may be vulnerable to penetration or attacks by computer programmers and hackers, or breached due to employee error, malfeasance or other disruptions. In addition, as a provider of products and services to governments, our products and services may be the targets of cyber-attacks that attempt to sabotage or otherwise disable them, or our cybersecurity and other products and services ultimately may not be able to effectively detect, prevent, or protect against or otherwise mitigate losses from all cyber-attacks. Any such breach could compromise our networks or cloud-based services, creating system disruptions or slowdowns and exploiting security vulnerabilities of our products, and the information stored as part of our operations could be accessed, publicly disclosed, lost or stolen, which could subject us to liability to our customers, suppliers, business partners and others, could require significant management attention and resources, could result in the loss of business, regulatory actions and potential liability, and could cause us reputational and financial harm. In addition, sophisticated hardware and operating system software and applications that we produce or procure from third parties may contain defects in design or manufacture, including "bugs" and other

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problems that could unexpectedly interfere with the operation of our networks. This can be true even for “legacy” products that have been determined to have reached an end of life engineering status but will continue to operate for a limited amount of time.

If an actual or perceived breach of network security occurs in our network or in the network of a customer of our networking products, regardless of whether the breach is attributable to our products, the market perception of the effectiveness of our products could be harmed. In addition, the economic costs to us to eliminate or alleviate cyber or other security problems, bugs, viruses, worms, malicious software systems and security vulnerabilities could be significant and may be difficult to anticipate or measure. Because the techniques used by computer programmers and hackers, many of whom are highly sophisticated and well-funded, to access or sabotage networks change frequently and generally are not recognized until after they are used, we may be unable to anticipate or immediately detect these techniques. This could impede our sales, manufacturing, distribution or other critical functions, which could adversely affect our business.

Market conditions and changes in the industry could lead to discontinuation of our products or businesses resulting in asset impairments.

In response to changes in industry and market conditions, we may be required to strategically realign our resources and consider restructuring, disposing of, or otherwise exiting businesses, particularly as a function of macroeconomic challenges resulting from COVID-19. Any decision to limit investment in, dispose of, or otherwise exit businesses may result in the recording of special charges, such as inventory and technology-related write-offs, workforce reduction costs, charges relating to consolidation of excess facilities, or claims from third parties who were resellers or users of discontinued products. Our estimates with respect to the useful life or ultimate recoverability of our carrying basis of assets, including purchased intangible assets, could change as a result of such assessments and decisions. Although in certain instances, our supply agreements allow us the option to cancel, reschedule, and adjust our requirements based on our business needs prior to firm orders being placed, our loss contingencies may include liabilities for contracts that we cannot cancel with contract manufacturers and suppliers. Further, our estimates relating to the liabilities for excess facilities are affected by changes in real estate market conditions. 

If our products do not effectively inter-operate with our customers’ networks and result in cancellations and delays of installations, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be harmed.

Our products are designed to interface with our customers’ existing networks, each of which have different specifications and utilize multiple protocol standards and products from other vendors. Many of our customers’ networks contain multiple generations of products that have been added over time as these networks have grown and evolved. Our products must inter-operate with many or all of the products within these networks as well as future products in order to meet our customers’ requirements. If we find errors in the existing software or defects in the hardware used in our customers’ networks, we may need to modify our software networking solutions to fix or overcome these errors so that our products will inter-operate and scale with the existing software and hardware, which could be costly and could negatively affect our business, financial condition, and results of operations. In addition, if our products do not inter-operate with those of our customers’ networks, demand for our products could be adversely affected or orders for our products could be canceled. This could harm our operating results, financial condition and damage our reputation, and seriously harm our business and prospects.

Our revenues may decline as a result of changes in public funding of educational institutions.

A portion of our revenues comes from sales to both public and private K-12 educational institutions. Public schools receive funding from local tax revenues, and from state and federal governments through a variety of programs, many of which seek to assist schools located in underprivileged or rural areas. The funding for a portion of our sales to educational institutions comes from a federal funding program known as the E-Rate program. E-Rate is a program of the Federal Communications Commission that subsidizes the purchase of approved telecommunications, Internet access, and internal connection costs for eligible public educational institutions.  The E-Rate program, its eligibility criteria, the timing and specific amount of federal funding actually available and which Wi-Fi infrastructure and product sectors will benefit, are uncertain and subject to final federal program approval and funding appropriation continues to be under review by the Federal Communications Commission, and we cannot assure that this program or its equivalent will continue, and as a result, our business may be harmed. Furthermore, if state or local funding of public education is significantly reduced because of legislative or policy changes or by reductions in tax revenues due to changing economic conditions, or from the effect of budgets because of COVID-19, our sales to educational institutions may be negatively impacted by these changed conditions.  Any reduction in spending on information technology systems by educational institutions would likely materially and adversely affect our business and results of operations.  This is a specific example of the many factors which add additional uncertainty to our future revenues from our end-customers in the education sector.

Natural or man-made disasters, acts of war or terrorism, pandemics, technological disruptions or other events beyond our control could disrupt our operations and harm our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our corporate headquarters are located in Silicon Valley in Northern California. Historically, this region as well as our R&D centers in North Carolina and New Hampshire have been vulnerable to natural disasters and other risks, such as earthquakes, fires, floods and tropical storms, which at times have disrupted the local economy and posed physical risks to our property. We have

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contract manufacturers located in Taiwan and Mexico where similar natural disasters and other risks may disrupt the local economy and pose physical risks to our property and the property of our contract manufacturer.

In addition, the continued threat of terrorism and heightened security and military action in response to this threat, or any future acts of terrorism, may cause further disruptions to the economies of the United States and other countries. If such disruptions result in delays or cancellations of customer orders for our products, our business, financial condition and operating results will suffer.

Civil unrest or riots could disrupt demand for products, supply chain, or distribution and could negatively impact our costs or revenue. Systemic disruptions to the availability or integrity of utilities, transportation infrastructure, or the internet could have significant macroeconomic impacts, decreasing demand for our products and impacting our ability to get them to market.  As a result, our financial situation and operating results would be negatively affected.

See also, Item 1A. Risk Factors—“The coronavirus outbreak has had, and could continue to have, a materially disruptive effect on our business.”

Item 1B. Unresolved Staff Comments

None.

Item 2. Properties

Our corporate headquarters is located in San Jose, California where we currently lease approximately 185,000 square feet of space under a lease agreement that expires in fiscal year 2027.

In addition to our headquarters in San Jose, we lease additional sites in the United States, including facilities in Salem, New Hampshire and Morrisville/Raleigh, North Carolina for research and development, sales and marketing and administrative offices. Outside the United States, we also lease office space in various other international geographic locations for research and development, sales and service personnel and administration in other Americas, EMEA and APAC, including Bangalore, India, Chennai, India, Markham, Canada, Reading, United Kingdom, and Shannon, Ireland.

As of June 30, 2020, we have leased approximately 1.1 million square feet of space with various expiration dates between fiscal year 2020 and fiscal 2028. We believe that our current facilities are sustainable and adequate to meet our current needs and the productive capacity of such facilities is substantially being utilized or we have plans to utilize such capacity.

Item 3. Legal Proceedings

The information set forth under the heading “Legal Proceedings” in Note 10, Commitments and Contingencies, in Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8 of Part II of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, is incorporated herein by reference.

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

Common Stock Market and Dividends

Our common stock trades on the Nasdaq Global Market and commenced trading on Nasdaq on April 9, 1999 under the symbol “EXTR”.

As of August 25, 2020, there were 176 stockholders of record of our common stock.  Because many of our shares of 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. We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our capital stock and do not anticipate paying any cash dividends in the foreseeable future.

Certain information regarding our equity compensation plan(s) as required by Part II is incorporated by reference from our definitive Proxy Statement to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in connection with the solicitation of proxies for our year ended June 30, 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders no later than 120 days after the end of the fiscal year covered by this report.

STOCK PRICE PERFORMANCE GRAPH

Set forth below is a stock price performance graph comparing the annual percentage change in the cumulative total return on our common stock with the cumulative total returns of the CRSP Total Return Index for The Nasdaq Stock Market (U.S. companies) and the Nasdaq Computer Manufacturers Securities for the period commencing July 1, 2015 and ending on June 30, 2020.  The comparisons in the graph below are based on historical data and are not intended to forecast the possible future performance of our common stock.

Comparison of Five-Year Cumulative Total Returns

Performance Graph for Extreme Networks, Inc.

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Data and graph are calculated from CRSP Total Return Index for the Nasdaq Stock Market (U.S. Companies) and Nasdaq Computer Manufacturers Securities, Center for Research in Security Prices (CRSP), Booth School of Business, and The University of Chicago. Used with permission. All rights reserved.

Item 6. Selected Financial Data

The following table sets forth selected consolidated financial data for each of the fiscal years ended June 30, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017 and 2016 derived from the Company’s audited financial statements (in thousands, except per share amounts). These tables should be reviewed in conjunction with the Consolidated Financial Statements in Item 8 and related Notes, as well as Item 7, “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations.” Historical results may not be indicative of future results.