Broadcom Inc. · Risk factors

•Adverse global economic conditions could have a negative effect on us.

•Our business is subject to various governmental regulations and trade restrictions.

•Global political and economic conditions and other factors related to our international operations could adversely affect us.

•We operate in a highly cyclical semiconductor industry that is undergoing profound change due to AI.

•A significant reduction in demand or loss of one or more of our significant customers may adversely affect us.

•A slow or the unsuccessful return on our investments in research and development, expansion of our business strategy or adoption of new business models could adversely affect us.

•Winning business in the semiconductor solutions industry is an unpredictable process that often requires us to incur significant expenses, evolve our business strategy or adopt a new business model, which may negatively impact our results of operations, gross margin or cash flows.

•Dependence on a limited number of contract manufacturers and suppliers of critical materials and components within our supply chain, and potential failure to adjust such manufacturing and supply chain to meet customer demand, may adversely affect our ability to bring products to market and our results of operations.

•We are dependent on senior management and if we are unable to attract and retain qualified personnel, we may not be able to execute our business strategy effectively.

•Our ability to maintain or improve gross margin.

•Cybersecurity threats or other security breaches, or any other impairment of the confidentiality, integrity or availability of our information technology (“IT”) systems, or those of one or more of our corporate infrastructure vendors, could have a material adverse effect on our business.

•A prolonged disruption of our or our customers’ or suppliers’ facilities or other significant operations could have a material adverse effect on us.

•We may be unable to maintain appropriate manufacturing capacity or product yields at our own manufacturing facilities.

•We are subject to risks associated with our distributors and other channel partners.

•Failure of our software portfolio to manage and secure IT infrastructures and environments and our use of open source software in certain software and services could have a material adverse effect on our business.

•The growth of our software business depends on demand for our data center virtualization portfolio, as well as customer acceptance of our software, services and business strategy.

•Incompatibility of our software portfolio with operating environments, platforms, or third-party products may adversely affect demand for our software and services.

•Failure to enter into software license agreements on a satisfactory basis could adversely affect us.

•Our sales to government customers subject us to uncertainties and additional governmental regulations.

•Failure to effectively manage our software solutions and services lifecycles could harm our business.

•Competition in our industries could prevent us from growing our revenue.

•Our operating results are subject to substantial quarterly and annual fluctuations.

•We have pursued, and may in the future pursue, mergers, acquisitions, investments, joint ventures and dispositions, which could adversely affect our results of operations.

•We may be involved in legal proceedings that could materially adversely affect our business.

•Failure to protect the IP utilized in our business could adversely affect our business.

•We are subject to warranty claims, product recalls and product liability.

•The complexity of our products could result in unforeseen delays or expense or undetected defects or bugs.

•We are subject to privacy and data security laws and contractual commitments, and our actual or perceived failure to comply with such laws and commitments could harm our business.

•Corporate responsibility matters may adversely affect our relationships with customers and investors and increase compliance costs.

•We must comply with a variety of technical standards, domestic and international laws and regulations in the manufacture and distribution of our semiconductors.

•Our income taxes and overall cash tax costs are affected by a number of factors that could have a material, adverse effect on our financial results.

•If our tax incentives or tax holiday arrangements change or cease to be in effect or applicable, our corporate income taxes could significantly increase.

•We have potential tax liabilities as a result of VMware’s former controlling ownership by Dell, which could have an adverse effect on our financial condition and operating results.

A general weakening of the economy globally or in a particular region or industry, uncertainty and volatility in financial markets, efforts of governments to stimulate or stabilize the economy or to achieve specific policy objectives such as onshoring of semiconductor manufacturing and other unfavorable changes in economic conditions, such as inflation, higher interest rates, tightening of the credit markets, recession or slowing growth, as well as an increase in trade tensions and related tariffs with U.S. trading partners, could negatively impact our business, financial condition, cash flows and liquidity. Adverse global economic conditions have from time to time caused or exacerbated significant slowdowns in the industries and markets in which we operate, which have adversely affected our business and results of operations.

Macroeconomic weakness and uncertainty may also make it more difficult to accurately forecast operating results, and market volatility stemming from current macroeconomic events may materially impact our cash flow and our ability to raise or refinance debt at favorable rates. T1An escalation of trade tensions between the U.S. and its trading partners may continue to result in trade restrictions and increased protectionism on both ends that harm our ability to participate in some markets or compete effectively.

Sustained uncertainty about, or worsening of, current global economic conditions, further tariffs and escalations of trade tensions between the U.S. and its trading partners, especially China, increased geopolitical volatility, and the decoupling of the global economies could result in a global economic slowdown and long-term changes to global trade. Such events may also (i) cause our customers and end-users to reduce, delay or forgo technology spending, (ii) result in customers sourcing products from other suppliers not subject to such restrictions or tariffs or to develop these products themselves, (iii) lead to the insolvency or consolidation of key suppliers and customers, and (iv) intensify pricing pressures. Any or all of these factors could negatively affect demand for our products and our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our business is subject to various domestic and international laws and other legal requirements, including antitrust and import/export regulations, such as the U.S. Export Administration Regulations, and applicable executive orders. These laws, regulations, orders, tariffs, federal policies and other governmental actions are complex, continue to evolve and change frequently with limited notice and generally become more stringent over time. We may be required to incur significant expenses to comply with these legal requirements or respond to any governmental actions. In addition, if our suppliers or customers fail or choose not to comply with these legal requirements or governmental actions, we may be required to suspend purchasing from such suppliers or selling to such customers, which could damage our reputation and have a material adverse impact on our results of operations.

The U.S. government continues to add companies to its restricted entity list and/or technologies to its list of prohibited exports to specific countries and impose other restrictions or requirements, which have had and may in the future have an adverse effect on our revenue, supply chain and our ability to manufacture or sell our products. These restrictive governmental actions and any similar measures that may be imposed on U.S. companies by other governments, especially in light of ongoing trade tensions with U.S. trading partners, will likely limit or prevent us from doing business with certain of our customers or suppliers and harm our ability to compete effectively or otherwise negatively affect our ability to sell our products.

Furthermore, foreign government authorities have proposed and/or may take retaliatory actions, impose conditions for the supply of products or require the license or other transfer of IP, which could have a material adverse effect on our business. Uncertainty due to such evolving policies or actions also may disrupt our supply chain and if we are unable to effectively mitigate any adverse impacts from such measures, this could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our products and operations are also subject to regulation by U.S. and non-U.S. regulatory agencies, such as the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. We have been, and may in the future be, involved or required to participate in regulatory investigations or inquiries from regulatory authorities in Korea, Japan and the European Union into certain of our contracting and business practices, which have and may in the future evolve into legal or other administrative proceedings. T2The technology industry is subject to intense media, political and regulatory scrutiny, which can increase our exposure to government investigations, regulations, legal actions and penalties. Involvement in regulatory investigations or inquiries can be costly, lengthy, complex and time-consuming, diverting the attention and energies of our management and technical personnel.

If any pending or future governmental investigations result in an unfavorable resolution, we could be required to cease the manufacture and sale of the subject products or technology, pay fines or disgorge profits or other payments, and/or cease certain conduct and/or modify our contracting or business practices, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

A majority of our products are produced, sourced and sold internationally and our international revenue represents a significant percentage of our overall revenue. Multiple factors relating to our international operations and to particular countries in which we operate could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. These factors include:

•changes in political, regulatory, legal or economic conditions, geopolitical turmoil (including China-Taiwan relations), including terrorism, war or political or military coups, state-sponsored or politically motivated cyber-attacks, civil disturbances, or political instability (foreign and domestic);

•restrictive or retaliatory governmental actions, such as restrictions on the transfer or repatriation of funds and foreign investments, data privacy regulations, sustainability-related regulations, trade protection measures, including increasing protectionism and economic nationalism, import/export restrictions (including with regards to advanced technologies), import/export duties and quotas, trade sanctions, and customs duties and tariffs, all of which have increased and may further increase;

•changes in global tax regulations;

•difficulty in obtaining product distribution and support, and transportation delays;

•potential inability to localize our software;

•difficulty in enforcing contracts, collecting accounts receivables and maintaining appropriate financial controls;

•difficulty in conducting due diligence with respect to business partners;

•public health or safety concerns, medical epidemics or pandemics, and other natural- or man-made disasters; and •nationalization of businesses and expropriation of assets.

While U.S. tariffs and counter-tariffs, including semiconductor-related tariffs, have not had a material impact on our financial condition or results of operations, tariffs and other macroeconomic factors could materially increase costs and disrupt our supply chain. We continuously manage product availability and costs in our supply chain to mitigate the direct and indirect impact of tariffs and other macroeconomic impacts. The ultimate impact remains uncertain and will depend on several factors outside of our control. If we are unable to effectively navigate these changes, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and stock price.

A significant legal risk associated with conducting business internationally is compliance with the various and differing laws and regulations of the many countries in which we do business. Although our policies and procedures prohibit us, our employees and our agents from engaging in unethical business practices and are designed to satisfy regulatory requirements, there can be no assurance that all of these measures will be effective in preventing violations or claims of violations. Any such violation or perceived violation could have a material adverse effect on our business.

The semiconductor industry is highly cyclical and is subject to rapid price erosion, wide fluctuations in product supply and demand, constant and rapid technological change, evolving technical standards and evolving product applications. T3The semiconductor industry is undergoing profound change due to the adoption and proliferation of AI and has experienced a significant upturn, which may not be sustainable. The growth of AI is creating pressure on the semiconductor industry to timely design, manufacture and deliver semiconductor products and solutions to meet customer demand for computing power and AI infrastructure. Some of these AI customers may have constrained resources or capital and may be unable to pay for their required AI infrastructure and/or seek alternative financings or novel or deferred payment models from their vendors and suppliers.

If our AI customers substantially reduce their expansion plans, cancel, reduce or delay their orders, are unable to generate the profit required to offset their spending or are otherwise unable to meet their obligations and we cannot offset the downturn in their business, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results, financial condition and stock price.

We have historically depended on a small number of end customers, OEMs, their respective contract manufacturers (“CMs”) and certain distributors for a majority of our business and revenue. For fiscal year 2025, sales to distributors accounted for 48% of our net revenue. T4We believe aggregate sales, through all channels, to our top five end customers accounted for approximately 40% of our net revenue for fiscal year 2025. This customer concentration increases the risk of quarterly fluctuations in our operating results and our sensitivity to any material adverse developments experienced by these customers. In addition, some customers may reduce the amount of products or decline to purchase from us due to reduced capital expenditure spending, lack of access to sufficient capital, downturn in their business, purchases from our competitors or their internal development of the products.

When our semiconductor customers agree to purchase specific quantities of products or source an agreed portion of their product needs from us, such arrangements often include pricing schedules or methodologies that apply regardless of the volume of products purchased, and those customers from time to time may not or do not purchase the amount of product we expect. Moreover, our top customers, including our AI customers, may make and have made greater demands on us with regards to pricing and contractual terms, such as seeking to lease AI racks or systems based on our XPUs instead of purchasing, as well as alternative financings for such leases or other novel or deferred payment models.

As a result, we may not generate the amount of revenue or free cash flow or achieve the level of profitability that we or investors expect under such arrangements, and/or such arrangements may increase our exposure to credit or customer default risks. The loss of, or any substantial reduction in sales to, any of our top customers, including our customers for our custom AI accelerators or XPUs or AI racks or systems based on our XPUs, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows.

The industries in which we compete are characterized by rapid technological change, new technological developments such as AI and cloud computing, changes in customer requirements, frequent new product introductions and enhancements, short product cycles, evolving industry standards, and new delivery methods. In addition, to compete successfully in the semiconductor industry, we must continue to develop and respond to technological advancements and requirements, such as low-power consumption, higher bandwidth and large compute clusters, and we have, from time to time, evolved our business strategy and adopted new business models to address the needs and challenges of our customers. Failure to successfully develop increasingly advanced technologies, including our custom AI accelerators or XPUs, network switches and other AI-related products, or execute on new strategies or models such as the sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs could impair our competitive position.

In order to remain competitive, we have made, and expect to continue to make, significant investments in research and development, expand our business strategy or adopt new business models. If we fail to timely develop new and enhanced products and technologies, if we focus on technologies that do not become widely adopted, if new competitive technologies that we do not support become widely accepted, or if we are unable to successfully execute on new business strategies or models such as the sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs, demand for our products and solutions such as our custom AI accelerators or XPUs, network switches or other AI-related products may be reduced.

Slow or unsuccessful investments in our research and development efforts or expansion or modification of our business strategies and models and incurring significant expenses for these actions, would have a negative impact on our business, financial condition and margins.

Our semiconductor business is dependent on us winning competitive bid selection processes, known as “design wins.” These selection processes are often lengthy in time and can require us to dedicate significant development expenditures and scarce engineering resources in pursuit of a single customer opportunity. Failure to obtain a particular design win may prevent us from obtaining design wins in subsequent generations of a particular product. This can result in lost revenue and can weaken our position in future selection processes.

Winning a product design does not guarantee sales to a customer. Customers could accelerate, delay or cancel plans, use their own products, purchase products from our competitors, fail to qualify our products, reduce or discontinue use of our products, or fail to successfully market and sell their products, which could reduce demand for our products and cause us to hold a material amount of excess inventory, materially adversely affecting our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, we may also be unable to materially recoup our costs or resell our products to other customers due to the custom nature of certain products.

The timing of design wins is unpredictable and implementing production for a major design win or multiple design wins at the same time, such as our design wins for our custom AI accelerators or XPUs, network switches and other AI-related products, may strain our resources and those of our CMs. Some of our customers who have selected us may also have constrained resources or capital but require immediate availability of our custom XPUs. In such event, we may dedicate significant additional resources or execute on new business strategies or models such as the sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs to our customers with alternative financings or novel or deferred payment models, which could result in additional costs, expenses, credit or customer default risks, reduced gross margin and cash flows.

We operate a primarily outsourced manufacturing business model that principally utilizes CMs, such as third-party wafer foundries. Our semiconductor products require wafer manufacturers with state-of-the-art fabrication equipment and techniques, and most of our products are designed to be manufactured in a specific process, typically at one particular fab or foundry, either our own or with a particular CM. Qualifying and establishing reliable production at acceptable yields with a new CM, if at all, is a lengthy and often expensive process.

We depend on our CMs to allocate sufficient manufacturing capacity and critical components to meet our needs, to produce products of acceptable quality at acceptable yields and prices, and to deliver those products to us on a timely basis. We do not generally have long-term capacity commitments with our CMs and substantially all of our manufacturing services are on a purchase order basis with no minimum quantities. Further, our CMs may fail to timely develop or successfully implement new, advanced manufacturing processes, including transitions to smaller geometry process technologies. From time to time, our CMs may also cease to, or become unable to, manufacture a component for us, and have had capacity constraints in times of unprecedented demand.

T5During fiscal year 2025, approximately 95% of the wafers manufactured by our CMs were produced by TSMC. We believe our wafer requirements represent a meaningful portion of TSMC’s total production capacity. However, TSMC also fabricates wafers for other companies, including some of our competitors, and could choose or be required to materially prioritize capacity for other customers or reduce or eliminate deliveries to us on short notice. In addition, TSMC has raised, and may in the future raise, their prices to manufacture our wafers.

If any of the foregoing circumstances occur, we may be unable to meet our customers’ demand, or to the same extent as our competitors, fail to meet our contractual obligations or forgo revenue opportunities. This could damage our relationships with our customers, result in litigation for alleged failure to meet our obligations, or result in payment of significant damages, and our net revenue could decline, adversely affecting our business, financial condition, results of operations and gross margin.

We make significant decisions, including determining the levels of business that we will seek and accept, evolving our business strategy or adopting new business models such as the sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs, production schedules, levels of reliance on CMs and outsourcing, internal fabrication utilization and other resource requirements, based on customer requirements or estimates thereof, which may not be accurate and could result in reallocation of resources. Many factors could impact our estimates of customers’ demands, including changes in product development cycles, competing technologies and product releases, new or unexpected end-user products or applications, such as demand for AI-related products and solutions, and changes in business and economic conditions.

Our customers may also underestimate the data center or related power or water capacity needed to address end-user demand, which may impact our ability to timely satisfy their requirements. In addition, where our products are part of larger infrastructure projects like data centers, any supply constraints or availability issues with respect to any one component may impact our revenue or our results of operations. The Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors for America Act could also result in an increase in supply leading to excess inventory and a decrease in average selling prices. If we are unable to timely respond to changes in customer demand or execute on new business strategies or models, this could damage our customer relationships, harm our reputation, prevent us from taking advantage of opportunities and adversely impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our manufacturing processes and those of our CMs rely on many materials, including silicon, gallium arsenide and indium phosphide (“InP”) wafers, copper lead frames, precious and rare earth metals, mold compound, ceramic packages and various chemicals and gases. During fiscal year 2025, we purchased approximately two-thirds of our manufacturing materials from five materials suppliers, some of which are single source suppliers. The lead time needed to identify and qualify a new supplier is typically lengthy and there is often no readily available alternative source. We do not generally have long-term contracts with our materials suppliers and substantially all of our purchases are on a purchase order basis. Suppliers have previously, and may in the future, extend lead times, limit supplies, place products on allocation or increase prices, any of which could disrupt supply or increase demand in the industry.

Additionally, the supply of these materials has been, from time to time, impacted by increased trade tensions between the U.S. and its trading partners, particularly China, and the uncertainty due to evolving trade restrictions. Any such supply constraints could result in loss of revenue opportunities and adversely impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our success depends, in large part, on the continued contributions of our senior management team, and, in particular, the services of Hock E. Tan, our President and Chief Executive Officer. Effective succession planning is also important for our long-term success. Failure to ensure effective transfers of knowledge and smooth transitions involving senior management could hinder our strategic planning and execution. None of our senior management is bound by written employment contracts. In addition, we do not currently maintain key person life insurance covering our senior management. The loss of any of our senior management could harm our ability to implement our business strategy and respond to the rapidly changing market conditions in which we operate.

Our gross margin is highly dependent on our product mix, as well as the timing and amount of our revenue from our semiconductor solutions, software licensing and other products or solutions. In addition, increased competition and the existence of product alternatives, more complex engineering requirements, lower demand, shifts in spending priorities, constrained resources or capital of our customers, unfavorable changes in economic conditions, industry oversupply or reductions in our technological lead compared to our competitors, and other factors have in the past and may in the future lead to further price erosion, lower revenue and lower gross margin. The gross margin for our semiconductor solutions has typically been lower than our infrastructure software solutions. T6The sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs will likely increase our operating margin but compress or lower future gross margin, which would adversely impact our stock price.

Our business depends on a wide variety of complex IT systems and services, including cloud-based and other critical corporate services relating to, among other things, product research and development, financial reporting, product orders and fulfillment, HR, benefit plan administration, IT network management, and electronic communication and collaboration services. These systems and services are both internally managed and outsourced, and in many cases we rely upon third-party data centers. Any failure of these internal or third-party systems and services to operate effectively could disrupt our operations and could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. Our operations are dependent upon our ability to protect our IT infrastructure against damage from business continuity events that could have a significant disruptive effect.

Although these systems are designed to protect and secure our customers’, suppliers’ and employees’ confidential information, as well as our own proprietary information, we are, out of necessity, dependent on our vendors and third-party data centers to adequately address cybersecurity threats to their own systems and infrastructure, and timely deploy necessary mitigations. In addition, software products we use and technologies produced by us have occasionally had in the past and may have in the future, vulnerabilities that, if left unmitigated, could reduce the overall level of security of the systems on which the software is installed.

T7Cyber-attacks are increasing in number and sophistication, are well-financed, in some cases supported by state actors, and are designed to not only attack, but also to evade detection. Since the techniques used to obtain unauthorized access to systems, or to otherwise sabotage them, change frequently and are often not recognized until launched against a target, we have in the past been, and may in the future be, unable to anticipate these techniques or to implement adequate preventative measures. The emergence and maturation of AI capabilities may also lead to new and/or more sophisticated methods of attack, including fraud that relies upon “deep fake” impersonation technology or other forms of generative automation that may scale up the efficiency or effectiveness of cyber threat activity.

As a critical vendor in the digital supply chain for both governmental entities and critical infrastructure operators, we and our products may be targeted by those seeking to threaten the confidentiality, integrity and availability of systems supporting essential public services. Geopolitical instability may increase the likelihood that we will experience direct or collateral consequences from cyber conflicts between nation-states or other politically motivated actors targeting critical technology infrastructure.

Accidental or willful security breaches or other unauthorized access to our information systems or the systems of our service providers and business partners, or the existence of computer viruses or malware (such as ransomware) in our or their data or software have in the past exposed, and could in the future expose, us to a risk of information loss, business disruption, and misappropriation of proprietary and confidential information, including information relating to our products or customers and the personal information of our employees or third parties. Such an event could result in, among other things, unfavorable publicity, damage to our reputation, loss of our trade secrets and other competitive information, litigation by affected parties and possible financial obligations for liabilities and damages related to the theft or misuse of such information, significant remediation costs, disruption of key business operations and significant diversion of our resources, as well as fines and other sanctions resulting from any regulatory non-compliance, any of which could have a material adverse effect on our business, profitability and financial condition.

While we may be entitled to damages if our vendors fail to perform under their agreements with us, any award may be insufficient to cover the actual costs incurred by us and, as a result of a vendor’s failure to perform, we may be unable to collect any damages.

Despite our internal controls and investment in security measures, we have, from time to time, been subject to disruptive cyber-attacks and unauthorized network intrusions and malware on our own IT networks or those of our service providers or business partners. Although no such cybersecurity incidents have been material to us, we continue to devote resources to protect our systems and data from unauthorized access or misuse, and we may be required to expend greater resources in the future. Businesses we acquire have previously increased, and may continue to increase, the scope and complexity of our IT networks, and this has, from time to time, increased our risk exposure to cyber-attacks when there are difficulties integrating diverse legacy systems that support operations for the acquired businesses.

In addition, certain aspects of effective cybersecurity are dependent upon our employees, contractors and other trusted partners reliably safeguarding secrets (e.g., application credentials) and adhering to our security policies and access control mechanisms. We have in the past experienced, and expect in the future to experience, security incidents arising from a failure to properly handle such secrets or adhere to such policies and, although no such events have had a material adverse effect on our business, there can be no assurance that an insider threat will not result in a material cyber incident. Our logging, alerting and cyber incident detection mechanisms have technical limitations that, in some instances, have led, and may in the future lead, to gaps in visibility into events occurring on systems targeted by threat actors or other unauthorized activities, and have not and may not always capture or surface information sufficient to timely detect and take responsive action to insider or external threats.

U.S. and non-U.S. regulators, as well as customers and service providers, have also increased their focus on cybersecurity vulnerabilities and risks. Compliance with laws, regulations, and contractual provisions concerning privacy, cybersecurity, secure technology development, data governance, data protection, confidentiality and IP could result in significant expense, and any failure to comply could result in proceedings against us by regulatory authorities or other third parties and may also increase our overall compliance burden. See also “Failure of our software portfolio to manage and secure IT infrastructures and environments could have a material adverse effect on our business.”

Our future success depends on our ability to attract, retain and motivate qualified personnel. As the source of our technological and product innovations, our engineering and technical personnel, such as our AI-related product engineers and cybersecurity experts, are a significant asset. T8Competition for these employees is significant in many areas of the world in which we operate, particularly in Silicon Valley and Southeast Asia where qualified engineers are in high demand. In addition, current or future immigration laws may make it more difficult to hire or retain qualified engineers, further limiting the pool of available talent. We believe equity awards provide a powerful long-term retention incentive and have historically granted these awards to the substantial majority of our employees.

If we are unable to continue our current equity granting philosophy or our stock underperforms, this could impair our efforts to attract and retain necessary personnel. Any inability to retain, attract or motivate such personnel and provide competitive employment benefits could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Although we operate a primarily outsourced manufacturing business model, we also rely on our own manufacturing facilities, in particular in Fort Collins, Colorado, Singapore, and Breinigsville, Pennsylvania. Our Fort Collins and Breinigsville facilities are the sole sources for the FBAR filters used in many of our wireless devices and for the InP-based wafers used in our fibre optics products, respectively. Many of our facilities, and those of our CMs and suppliers, are concentrated in the same geographic regions of California and the Pacific Rim, which have above average seismic, wildfire, and severe weather activity, and increases the risk of natural disasters impacting multiple suppliers. In addition, a significant majority of our research and development personnel are located in the U.S. and India, and our primary warehouse is in Malaysia.

A prolonged disruption at or shut-down of one or more of our manufacturing or other facilities or those of our CMs, suppliers or customers, including data centers, due to natural- or man-made disasters or other events outside of our control, such as climate change, severe weather events, water or power shortages, political unrest, military conflicts, geopolitical turmoil, trade tensions, government orders, labor shortages, medical epidemics, economic instability, equipment failure or for any other reason, would limit our capacity to meet customer demands and delay new product development until a replacement facility and equipment, if necessary, were found, and could destroy our hardware products, inventory or equipment. To date, such events have not had a material adverse effect on our business.

However, such an event could disrupt our operations, forgo revenue opportunities, potentially lose market share, result in us being unable to timely satisfy customer demand, expose us to claims by our customers, result in significant expense to repair or replace our affected facilities, products or equipment, and, in some instances, could significantly curtail our research and development efforts in a particular product area or target market, any of which could materially and adversely affect our business. This disruption could also prevent our customers from resuming their own manufacturing or providing services, including through their AI data centers, following such an event, they may cancel or scale back their orders from us and this may in turn adversely affect our results of operations.

We may not have any or sufficient insurance coverage to recoup the losses and such events could also result in increased fixed costs relative to the revenue we generate and adversely affect our results of operations.

We must maintain appropriate capacity and product yields at our own manufacturing facilities to meet anticipated customer demand. From time to time, this requires us to invest in expansion or improvements of those facilities, which may not be sufficient or in time, to meet customer demand and we may have to put customers on product allocation, forgo sales or lose customers as a result. Conversely, if we overestimate customer demand, we would experience excess capacity and fixed costs at these facilities will not be fully absorbed, which could adversely affect our results of operations. Similarly, reduced product yields, due to design or manufacturing issues or otherwise, may involve significant time and cost to remedy and cause delays in our ability to supply product to our customers, all of which could cause us to forgo sales, incur liabilities or lose customers, and harm our results of operations.

We sell our products through a direct sales force and a select network of distributors and other channel partners globally. Sales to distributors accounted for 48% of our net revenue in fiscal year 2025 and are subject to a number of risks, including:

•fluctuations in demand based on our distributors’ product inventory levels, and the timing of delivery to and demand of end customers;

•our distributors and other channel partners are generally not subject to minimum sales requirements or any obligation to market our products to their customers and may market and distribute competing products; and •our distributors’ and other channel partners’ agreements are generally nonexclusive and may be terminated at any time without cause.

Our dependence on channel partners has increased following the acquisition of VMware. Failure to maintain good relationships with our distributors and channel partners could materially adversely impact our business. In addition, we sell our semiconductor products through an increasingly limited number of distributors, which exposes us to additional customer concentration and related credit risks.

From time to time, we enlist our distributors and channel partners to lead go-to-market and customer relationships for certain products, such as our Accelerate Program and Catalyst Initiative for certain infrastructure software products, with certain sole distribution relationships by region. To the extent these distributors and channel partners fail to maintain good relationships with our customers or we are unable to continue enlisting our distributors and channel partners to lead go-to-market and customer relationships, our business, operating results and cash flow may be adversely impacted.

We do not always have a direct relationship with the end customers of our products. As a result, our semiconductor products may be used in applications for which they were not necessarily designed or tested, and the misuse or failure of our semiconductor products could result in significant liabilities to us, damage our reputation and harm our business, operating results and cash flow.

Certain aspects of our software portfolio are intended to manage and secure IT infrastructures and environments, and as a result, we expect these products to be ongoing targets of cyber-attacks. Open source code or other third-party software used in these products could also be targeted and may make our software vulnerable to additional security risks not posed by purely proprietary software. Our software portfolio is complex and, when deployed, has contained in the past and may contain in the future errors, defects or security vulnerabilities, some of which were undiscovered before the software was released, installed and used by customers. The complexity and breadth of our technical and production environments, which involve globally dispersed development and engineering teams, increases the risk that errors, defects or vulnerabilities will be introduced and may delay our ability to detect, mitigate or remediate such incidents.

In the past, elements of our proprietary source code have been exposed in an unauthorized manner. It is possible that such exposure of source code could reveal unknown security vulnerabilities in our software that could be exploited by malicious actors. Our software is also subject to known and unknown security vulnerabilities, including those resulting from integration with third-party products or services.

Although we continually seek to improve our countermeasures to prevent such incidents, we may be unable to anticipate every scenario and, as a result, certain cyber threats or vulnerabilities have in the past been and may in the future be undetected or unmitigated in time to prevent harm to us or our customers. Additionally, efforts by malicious cyber actors or others could cause interruptions, delays or cessation of our software delivery, or modification of our software, which could cause us to lose existing or potential customers.

A successful cyber-attack, or false reports thereof, involving our software could cause customers and potential customers to believe our software is ineffective or unreliable and result in, among other things, the loss of customers, unfavorable publicity, damage to our reputation, difficulty in marketing our software, and allegations by our customers that we have not performed our contractual obligations, and could give rise to significant costs, including costs related to developing solutions or indemnification obligations under our agreements. Any such event could adversely impact our revenue and results of operations. See also “Cybersecurity threats or other security breaches, or any other impairment of the confidentiality, integrity or availability of our IT systems, or those of one or more of our corporate infrastructure vendors, could have a material adverse effect on our business.”

Many of our software solutions and services are based on data center virtualization and related hybrid-cloud technologies used to manage distributed computing architectures, which form the foundation for private and hybrid cloud computing. Enabling businesses to modernize applications and efficiently implement their private and hybrid cloud services presents new and difficult technological, operational and compliance challenges. If businesses build new or shift existing compute workloads off-premises to public cloud providers, this could limit the market for on-premises deployments of our data center virtualization portfolio. Current and future customers may not accept our perpetual licensing model or perceive benefits associated with adopting our enterprise-grade private and hybrid cloud platform or our simplified product portfolios, including new version releases.

If demand, adoption and continued usage of our software is significantly less than anticipated or we fail to realize the expected returns on our business strategy, the investments we have made to implement our strategy may be of no or limited value, we may lose significant customers and our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows may be adversely affected.

We may be required to make substantial modifications to our software to maintain compatibility with operating systems, systems software and computer hardware used by our customers or to provide our customers with desired features or capabilities. We must also continually address the challenges of dynamic and accelerating market trends and competitive developments, such as the emergence of advanced persistent threats in the security space, to compete effectively. There can be no assurance that we will be able to adapt our software in response to these developments.

Further, our software solutions interact with a variety of software and hardware developed by third parties, as well as cloud providers. If we lose access to third-party code and specifications for the development of code or cloud providers fail to support our software or otherwise limit the functionality, compatibility or certification of our software or otherwise impose unfavorable terms and conditions, this could negatively impact our ability to develop compatible software. This could result in higher research and development costs for the enhancement and modification of our existing software or development of new software solutions. Any additional restrictions could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and operating results and cash flow.

Many of our existing software customers have multi-year enterprise software license agreements, some of which involve substantial aggregate fee amounts. These customers often do not have a contractual obligation to purchase additional solutions and may have the right to terminate. The failure or inability to renew customer agreements of similar scope, on terms that are commercially attractive to us, could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, operating results and cash flow. In addition, software license agreements under which customers do not have the right to terminate could cause variations in revenue recognized in each period and our operating results fluctuate from time to time.

Many of our software solutions and services incorporate open source software, the use of which may subject us to certain conditions, including the obligation to offer such software for no cost or to make the proprietary source code of such software publicly available. Open source licenses are generally “as-is” and do not provide warranties, support or assurance of title or controls on origin, which may expose us to potential liability if the software fails to work or has security vulnerabilities.

Although we monitor our use of open source software to avoid subjecting our software to unintended conditions and security vulnerabilities, we may receive third-party claims regarding our compliance with the conditions of such open source licenses and we may be required to take steps to remedy an alleged infringement or noncompliance, including modifying or releasing our product code or paying damages.

Our contracts signed with the U.S. federal, state and local government and non-U.S. government agencies are generally subject to annual fiscal funding approval and may be renegotiated or terminated at the discretion of the government. Termination, renegotiation or the lack of funding approval for a contract could adversely affect our sales, revenue and reputation. If personnel critical to our performance of these contracts are unable to obtain or maintain their security clearances, we may be unable to perform these contracts or compete for other projects of this nature, which could adversely affect our results of operations. Additionally, our government contracts and our arrangements with channel partners who may sell directly to government customers are generally subject to requirements that may generally not be present in commercial contracts and/or may be complex, as well as audits and investigations.

Failure to meet contractual requirements could result in various civil and criminal actions and penalties, and administrative sanctions, including termination of contracts, refund of a portion of fees received, forfeiture of profits, suspension of payments, fines and suspensions or debarment from doing business with the government, which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, operating results and cash flow.

As part of the natural lifecycle of our software solutions and services, customers are informed when the software or services will be reaching their end of life or end of availability and will no longer be supported or receive updates and security patches. If these software solutions or services remain subject to a service contract, the customer may transition to alternative software or services. Failure to effectively manage our software and services lifecycles and communications thereof have previously led to, and may in the future lead to, customer dissatisfaction and potential contractual liabilities, which could materially adversely affect our business and operating results.

The industries in which we operate are highly competitive and characterized by rapid technological changes, evolving industry standards, changes in customer requirements, often aggressive pricing practices and, in some cases, new delivery methods. We expect competition in these industries to continue to increase as existing competitors improve or expand their product offerings or as new competitors, including our customers, enter our markets. To remain competitive, we seek to evolve our business strategy or adopt new business models from time to time, such as the sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs, that require significant financial resources, which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations.

Moreover, we may offer and have offered alternative financings or other novel or deferred payment models for the leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs to effectively complete, which could have a material adverse effect on our revenue, free cash flow and gross margin and expose us to credit or customer default risks.

Some of our competitors have longer operating histories, greater name recognition or presence in key markets, a larger installed customer base, larger technical staff, a more comprehensive IP portfolio or better patent protection, more established relationships with vendors or suppliers, or greater manufacturing, distribution, financial, research and development, technical and marketing resources than us. We face competition from companies that receive financial and other support from their home country government, customers who develop competing products, public cloud providers, numerous smaller companies that specialize in specific aspects of the highly fragmented software industry, open source authors who provide software and IP for free, and competitors who offer their products through try-and-buy or freemium models. In addition, the trend toward consolidation is also changing the competitive landscape. We expect this trend to continue, which may result in combined competitors having greater resources than we do.

The actions of our competitors, in the areas of pricing and product bundling in particular, could have a substantial adverse impact on us. Further, competitors may leverage their superior market position, as well as IP or other proprietary information, including interface, interoperability or technical information, in new and emerging technologies and platforms that may inhibit our ability to compete effectively. If we are unable to compete successfully, we may lose market share for our products or incur significant reduction in our gross margins, either of which could have a material adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

Our operating results have fluctuated in the past and are likely to fluctuate in the future. These fluctuations may occur on a quarterly and annual basis and are due to a number of factors, many of which are beyond our control. In addition to many of the risks described elsewhere in this “Risk Factors” section, these factors include, among others:

•the timing of launches by our customers of new products in which our products are included and changes in end-user demand for our customers’ products or services;

•fluctuations in the levels of component or product inventories held by our customers, which may lead to increased requests to delay shipment of our semiconductor products;

•the shift to cloud-based IT solutions and services, such as hyperscale computing, which may adversely affect the timing and volume of sales of our semiconductor products for use in enterprise data centers;

•the development and availability of AI data centers that could impact our ability to ship our products;

•the timing and extent of our software license and subscription revenue, and other non-product revenue;

•the timing of new software contracts and renewals, including the timing of software contracts that do not have termination for convenience clauses;

•the timing of any terminations of software contracts that require us to refund to customers any pre-paid amounts under the contract;

•the timing of contracts with distributors and channel partners to lead go-to-market and customer relationships for certain products;

•fluctuations in our financial metrics to execute our current or new business strategies or models;

•the timing and extent to which we enter into and utilize factoring arrangements;

•the timing and extent of delivery of and payment for our semiconductor and semiconductor-based solutions, including AI racks or systems based on our XPUs;

•the inability of our customers to pay for our products or services due to their constrained resources or capital;

•our ability to timely develop, introduce and market new products and technologies;

•new product announcements and introductions by us or our competitors;

•seasonality or other fluctuations in demand in our markets;

•timing and amount of research and development and related new product expenditures, and the timing of receipt of any research and development grant monies; and •timing of any regulatory changes, particularly with respect to trade sanctions and customs duties and tariffs, and tax reform, or changes in the interpretation or enforcement of existing requirements.

The foregoing factors are often difficult to predict, and these, as well as other factors, could materially adversely affect our quarterly or annual operating results. In addition, a significant amount of our operating expenses are relatively fixed in nature. Any failure to adjust spending quickly enough to compensate for a revenue shortfall could magnify the adverse impact of such revenue shortfall on our results of operations. As a result, we believe that quarter-to-quarter comparisons of our revenue and operating results may not be meaningful or reliable indicators of our future performance. If our operating results in one or more future quarters fail to meet the expectations of securities analysts or investors, a significant decline in the trading price of our common stock may occur, which may happen immediately or over time.

Our growth strategy includes acquiring or investing in businesses that offer complementary products, services and technologies, or enhancing our market coverage, business strategy or technological capabilities. Any acquisitions we may undertake, including the acquisition of VMware, and their integration involve risks and uncertainties, which could impede the execution of our business strategy, such as:

•U.S. and non-U.S. regulatory approval may take longer than anticipated, not be forthcoming or contain burdensome conditions, including due to U.S.-international relationships and other geopolitical events;

•market volatility impacting our ability or the cost to fund acquisitions or investments;

•unexpected delays, challenges and related expenses, and disruption of our business;

•diversion of management’s attention from daily operations and the pursuit of other opportunities;

•incurring significant restructuring charges and amortization expense, assuming liabilities and ongoing or new lawsuits, potential impairment of acquired goodwill and other intangible assets, and increasing our expenses and working capital requirements;

•the potential for deficiencies in internal controls of the acquired business, as well as implementing our own management information systems, operating systems and internal controls for the acquired business;

•our due diligence process may fail to identify significant issues with the acquired business’s products, financial disclosures, accounting practices, legal, tax and other contingencies, compliance with local laws and regulations (and interpretations thereof) in the U.S. and multiple international jurisdictions;

•difficulties integrating the acquired business or company and managing and retaining acquired employees, vendors and customers; and •inaccuracies in our original estimates and assumptions used to assess a transaction, which may result in us not realizing the expected financial or strategic benefits of any such transaction.

From time to time, we seek to divest or wind down portions of our business or exit minority investments, any of which could materially affect our cash flows and results of operations. Such dispositions involve risks and uncertainties, including disruption to other parts of our business, potential loss of employees or customers, or exposure to unanticipated liabilities or ongoing obligations following any such dispositions. In addition, dispositions may include the transfer of technology and/or the licensing of certain IP rights to third-party purchasers that limits our ability to utilize such IP rights or assert these rights against third parties. Such events could have a material adverse impact on our business and operations.

We are often involved in legal proceedings, including cases involving our IP rights and those of others, commercial matters, acquisition-related lawsuits, securities class action lawsuits, employee-related claims and other actions. Litigation or settlement of such actions, regardless of their merit, have been, and can continue to be, costly, lengthy, complex and time consuming, diverting the attention and energies of our management and technical personnel.

T9The industries in which we operate are characterized by companies holding large numbers of patents, copyrights, trademarks and trade secrets and vigorously pursuing, protecting and enforcing IP rights, including actions by patent-holding companies that do not make or sell products. From time to time, third parties assert against us and our customers and distributors their IP rights to technologies that are important to our business. We may be required to indemnify our customers or purchasers for third-party IP infringement claims, including costs to defend those claims, and payment of damages in the case of adverse rulings. However, our CMs and suppliers may or may not be required to indemnify us should we or our customers be subject to such third-party claims.

Claims of this sort could also harm our relationships with our customers and might deter future customers from doing business with us. If any pending or future proceedings result in an adverse outcome, we could be required to:

•cease the manufacture, use or sale of the infringing products, processes or technology and/or make changes to our processes or products;

•pay substantial damages for past, present and future use of the infringing technology, including up to treble damages if willful infringement is found;

•expend significant resources to develop non-infringing technology;

•license technology from the third-party claiming infringement, which license may not be available on commercially reasonable terms, or at all;

•enter into cross-licenses with our competitors, which could weaken our overall IP portfolio and our ability to compete in particular product categories;

•pay substantial damages to our direct or end customers to discontinue use or replace infringing technology with non-infringing technology; or •relinquish IP rights associated with one or more of our patent claims.

Any of the foregoing results could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our success depends in part upon protecting our IP. To accomplish this, we rely on a combination of IP rights, including patents, copyrights, trademarks and trade secrets, as well as customary contractual protections with our customers, suppliers, employees and consultants. We spend significant resources to monitor and protect our IP rights, including the unauthorized use of our products and usage rates of the software seat licenses and subscriptions that we sell. Even with significant expenditures, we may not be able to protect the IP rights that are valuable to our business or have sufficient IP rights to protect our products or our business. Further, effective IP protection may be unavailable or more limited in other jurisdictions, relative to those protections available in the U.S., and may not be applied for or may be abandoned in one or more relevant jurisdictions. In addition, when patents expire, we lose the protection and competitive advantages they provided to us.

We also generate revenue from licensing royalty payments and from technology claim settlements relating to certain of our IP. Licensing of our IP rights, particularly exclusive licenses, may limit our ability to assert those IP rights against third parties, including the licensee of those rights. In addition, from time to time, we acquire companies with IP that is subject to licensing obligations to other third parties. These licensing obligations have extended, and may in the future extend, to our own IP, limiting our ability to assert our IP rights.

From time to time, we pursue litigation to assert our IP rights, including, in some cases, against our customers and suppliers. Claims of this sort could also harm our relationships with our customers and might deter future customers from doing business with us. Conversely, third parties have and may in the future pursue IP litigation against us, including as a result of our IP licensing business. Any inability to adequately protect our IP could limit the value of our technology, result in the loss of opportunities to sell or license our technology to others or limit our collection of royalty payments, any of which could negatively impact our business, financial condition and results of operations.

In addition, from time to time, we obtain or renew IP licenses. Our inability to obtain or renew these licenses on acceptable terms, or at all, could have a material adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

From time to time, we may be subject to warranty or product liability claims that may lead to significant expense. Our customer contracts typically contain warranty and indemnification provisions, and in certain cases may also contain liquidated damages provisions. The potential liabilities associated with such provisions are significant, and in some cases, including in agreements with some of our largest customers, are potentially unlimited. Any such liabilities may greatly exceed any revenue we receive from the relevant products. Costs, payments or damages incurred or paid by us in connection with warranty and product liability claims and product recalls could materially adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations.

We may also be exposed to such claims as a result of any acquisition we may undertake in the future. Although we maintain self-insured retentions for reasonably estimable liabilities, our reserves may be inadequate to cover such claims.

Highly complex products, such as those we offer, have in the past contained, and may in the future contain, defects and bugs when they are first introduced or as new versions, software documentation or enhancements are released, or their release may be delayed due to unforeseen difficulties during product development. If any of our products or third-party components used in our products, contain defects or bugs, or have reliability, quality or compatibility problems, we may not be able to successfully design workarounds. Furthermore, if any of these problems are not discovered until after we have commenced commercial production or deployment, we may be required to incur additional development costs and product recall, repair or replacement costs.

Significant technical challenges also arise with our software portfolio because our customers are managing more complex, larger cloud infrastructures for more complex computing environments, license and deploy our portfolio across a variety of computer platforms and integrate them with a number of third-party software applications, databases and environments. As a result, if there is system-wide failure or an actual or perceived breach of information integrity, security or availability occurs in one of our end-user customer’s system, it can be difficult to determine which product is at fault and we could ultimately be harmed by the failure of another supplier’s product. Consequently, our reputation may be damaged, customers may be reluctant to buy our products, and we may have to invest significant capital and other resources, which could materially and adversely affect our ability to retain existing customers or attract new customers. As a result, our financial results could be materially adversely affected.

We collect, use and store (collectively referred to as “process” in this paragraph) certain personal information in connection with the operation of our business. This creates various levels of privacy risks across different parts of our business, depending on the type of personal information, the jurisdiction in question and the purpose of their processing. The personal information we process is subject to an increasing number of federal, state, local, and foreign laws and regulations regarding privacy and data security, as well as contractual commitments. Privacy legislation and other data protection regulations, enforcement and policy activity in this area are expanding rapidly in many jurisdictions and creating a complex regulatory compliance environment.

Sectoral legislation, certification requirements and technical standards applying to certain categories of our customers, such as those in the financial services or public sector, have exacerbated this trend. The cost of complying with and implementing these privacy-related and data governance measures could increase depending on any additional burdensome security, business processes, or business record or data localization requirements. Additionally, concerns about government interference and digital sovereignty, as well as expanding privacy, cybersecurity and data governance legislation, particularly in cloud computing and AI, could adversely affect our customers, our products and services and our own data management practices. The theft, loss or misuse of personal data collected, used, stored or transferred by us to run our business could result in significantly increased business and security costs or costs related to defending legal claims.

Any inadvertent failure or perceived failure by us to comply with privacy, data governance or cybersecurity obligations may result in governmental enforcement actions, litigation, substantial fines and damages, and could cause our customers to lose trust in us, which could have an adverse effect on our reputation and business.

Various jurisdictions, investors, customers and other stakeholders continue to focus on corporate responsibility matters. A number of our customers have adopted, or may adopt, procurement policies that include corporate responsibility provisions or requirements that their suppliers should comply with, or seek to include such provisions or requirements in their procurement terms and conditions. Some investors are asking companies to publicly disclose corporate responsibility-related policies, practices and metrics.

In addition, various jurisdictions have adopted, or are developing, complex and lengthy corporate responsibility-related laws or regulations that may be difficult to comply with and will increase our direct compliance costs, as well as indirect costs passed on to us from our customers and suppliers. If we fail to materially comply with or meet the evolving legal and regulatory requirements or expectations of our various stakeholders, we may be subject to enforcement actions, required to pay fines, face decreased customer demand or lose investors, which could harm our reputation, revenue and results of operations. Our actual or perceived failure to achieve our publicly disclosed corporate responsibility initiatives could negatively impact our reputation, subject us to litigation or enforcement actions, or otherwise harm our business.

Various adopted or proposed regulations and customer requirements could also adversely affect the sourcing, availability and pricing of minerals and materials used in or for the manufacture of semiconductor products. As a result, we may face difficulties in satisfying our customers’ demands, which may harm our revenue and results of operations.

The manufacture and distribution of our semiconductors must comply with technical standards and a variety of domestic and international laws and regulations, including those related to the materials composition or packaging of our semiconductor products, and the use, disposal, clean-up of and human exposure to hazardous materials. This could increase the complexity and costs of our product design and procurement operations, require us to stop distributing our products commercially until they comply with such new standards, lead our customers to suspend imports of their products into that country, require us to re-engineer our products and disrupt cross-border manufacturing relationships. In addition, we may be required to modify our manufacturing process or equipment, or be restricted in our ability to expand our facilities.

Any failure by us to comply with such requirements could result in litigation against us and the payment of significant fines and damages by us in the event of a significant adverse judgment. Any such event could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. Complying with any cleanup or remediation obligations for which we are or become responsible could also be costly and have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Our income taxes are subject to volatility and could be adversely affected by numerous factors, including reorganization or restructuring of our business, tax structure, business combinations, jurisdictional mix of our income and assets, and changes in tax legislation or accounting policies or related interpretations.

Our global income is subject to tax in the U.S. In addition, many countries are implementing anti-base-erosion legislation and guidance aimed at standardizing and modernizing global corporate tax policy, including changes to cross-border tax, transfer pricing documentation rules, and nexus-based tax incentive practices. Many countries have implemented or are in the process of implementing a global minimum tax, which we expect to materially increase our effective tax rate and cash tax costs for our fiscal year ending November 1, 2026. Substantial changes in domestic or international corporate tax policies, regulations or guidance, including the recently enacted One Big Beautiful Bill Act, as well as enforcement activities or legislative investigations and inquiries may materially adversely affect our business and impact our provision for income taxes, net income, cash flow and our results of operations generally.

Significant judgment is required in determining our worldwide income taxes, and our calculations of income taxes payable currently and on a deferred basis are based on our interpretations of applicable tax laws. 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. In addition, we are subject to, and are under, tax audits in various jurisdictions. Although we believe our tax positions are reasonable, the final determination of tax audits could be materially different from our income tax provisions and accruals, which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations and cash flows in the period or periods for which that determination is made.

Our operations benefit from the various tax incentives extended to us in various jurisdictions to encourage investment or employment. Each tax incentive and tax holiday is subject to our compliance with various conditions and may, in some instances, be amended or terminated prior to their scheduled termination date by the relevant governmental authority. If we cannot, or elect not to, comply with the conditions related to our tax incentive or tax holiday, we could be required to refund previously realized material tax benefits. If such tax incentive or tax holiday is modified or terminated prior to its expiration absent a new incentive applying, we could suffer material adverse tax and other financial consequences, which would increase our expenses, reduce our profitability and adversely affect our cash flows.

In addition, we may be required, or elect, to modify our operational structure and tax strategy in order to keep an incentive, which could result in a decrease in the benefits of the incentive. Adoption of global minimum tax provisions in a country in which we have an existing tax incentive could have a material adverse impact on the tax benefits of the incentive. Our tax incentives and tax holiday, before taking into consideration U.S. foreign tax credits, decreased the provision for income taxes by approximately $2,709 million in the aggregate and increased diluted net income per share by $0.56 for fiscal year 2025.

Our interpretations and conclusions regarding the tax incentives are not binding on any taxing authority, and if our assumptions and interpretations are incorrect, the benefits of the tax incentives may be adversely affected.

If the VMware spin-off from Dell in November 2021 is determined to not be tax-free for any reason, we could be liable for all or a portion of the tax liability, which could have a material adverse effect on our financial condition and operating results. Further, if the acquisition of VMware results in the spin-off failing to qualify as a tax-free transaction under Section 355 of the Internal Revenue Code, Dell, its affiliates and, potentially, its stockholders would incur significant tax liabilities and we may be required to indemnify Dell and its affiliates for any such tax liabilities, which could be material.

From time to time, we require significant expenditures to support our growth and respond to business challenges. As of November 2, 2025, the aggregate indebtedness was $67,120 million. Our substantial indebtedness and the instruments governing our indebtedness could have important consequences including:

•increasing our vulnerability to adverse general economic and industry conditions;

•limiting our flexibility in planning for, or reacting to, changes in the economy and the industries in which we operate;

•placing us at a competitive disadvantage compared to our competitors with less indebtedness;

•making it more difficult to borrow additional funds in the future to fund growth, acquisitions, working capital, capital expenditures and other purposes; and •potentially requiring us to dedicate a substantial portion of our cash flow from operations to payments on our indebtedness, thereby reducing the availability of our cash flow to fund our other business needs.

We receive debt ratings from the major credit rating agencies in the U.S., and any downgrade in our credit rating or the ratings of our indebtedness, or adverse conditions in the debt capital markets, could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations. In addition, the current market volatility may adversely impact our ability to manage our debt, including through borrowing at favorable interest rates or due to reduced cash flows.

The trading price of our common stock has, at times, fluctuated significantly and could be subject to wide fluctuations in response to any of the risk factors listed in this “Risk Factors” section, and others, including:

•issuance of new or updated research or other reports by securities analysts;

•anticipated or actual demand for products used in AI-related solutions, including ASICs such as custom AI accelerators or XPUs;

•broad market, industry and competitor-related fluctuations;

•unsubstantiated news reports or other inaccurate publicity regarding us or our business, or that of our significant customers;

•fluctuations in the valuation and results of operations of our significant customers as well as companies perceived by investors to be comparable to us;

•announcements of proposed acquisitions by us or our competitors;

•announcements of, or expectations of, additional debt or equity financing transactions;

•hedging or arbitrage trading activity involving our common stock; and •significant sales of our common stock by one or more of our largest investors.

These fluctuations are often unrelated or disproportionate to our operating performance. Broad market and industry fluctuations, as well as general economic, political and market conditions such as recessions, interest rate changes, market corrections or currency fluctuations, may negatively impact the market price of our common stock. You may not realize any return on your investment in us and may lose some or all of your investment. In the past, companies that have experienced volatility in the market price of their stock have been subject to securities class action litigation. We may be the target of this type of litigation in the future. In addition, we have been, and in the future we may be, subject to lawsuits stemming from our acquisitions.

Securities litigation against us, including the lawsuits related to such acquisitions, could result in substantial costs and divert our management’s attention from other business concerns, which could seriously harm our business.

The amount, timing and execution of our stock repurchase program may fluctuate based on our priorities for the use of cash for other purposes. These purposes include operational spending, capital spending, acquisitions, repayment of debt and returning cash to our stockholders as dividend payments. Changes in cash flows, tax laws and our stock price could also impact our stock repurchase program. We are not obligated to repurchase any specific amount of shares of common stock, and the stock repurchase program may be suspended or terminated at any time.

Our Board of Directors has adopted a dividend policy pursuant to which we currently pay a cash dividend on our common stock on a quarterly basis. The declaration and payment of any dividend is subject to the approval of our Board of Directors and our dividend may be discontinued or reduced at any time. Because we are a holding company, our ability to pay cash dividends is also limited by restrictions or limitations on our ability to obtain sufficient funds through dividends from subsidiaries. There can be no assurance that we will declare cash dividends in the future in any particular amounts, or at all. A reduction in our cash dividend payments could have a negative effect on our stock price.