eBay 2015 Annual Report Download - page 37

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Our success largely depends on key personnel. Because competition for our key employees is intense, we
may not be able to attract, retain, and develop the highly skilled employees we need to support our business. The
loss of senior management or other key personnel could harm our business.
Our future performance depends substantially on the continued services of our senior management and other
key personnel, including key engineering and product development personnel, and our ability to attract, retain,
and motivate key personnel. Competition for key personnel is intense, especially in the Silicon Valley where our
corporate headquarters are located, and we may be unable to successfully attract, integrate, or retain sufficiently
qualified key personnel. In making employment decisions, particularly in the Internet and high-technology
industries, job candidates often consider the value of the equity awards they would receive in connection with
their employment and fluctuations in our stock price may make it more difficult to attract, retain, and motivate
employees. In addition, we do not have long-term employment agreements with any of our key personnel and do
not maintain any “key person” life insurance policies. The loss of the services of any of our senior management
or other key personnel, or our inability to attract highly qualified senior management and other key personnel,
could harm our business.
Problems with or price increases by third parties who provide services to us or to our sellers could harm
our business.
A number of third parties provide services to us or to our sellers. Such services include seller tools that
automate and manage listings, merchant tools that manage listings and interface with inventory management
software, storefronts that help our sellers list items and shipping providers that deliver goods sold on our
platform, among others. Financial or regulatory issues, labor issues (e.g., strikes, lockouts, or work stoppages), or
other problems that prevent these companies from providing services to us or our sellers could harm our
business.
Price increases by, or service terminations, disruptions or interruptions at, companies that provide services
to us and our sellers and clients could also reduce the number of listings on our platforms or make it more
difficult for our sellers to complete transactions, thereby harming our business. Some third parties who provide
services to us or our sellers may have or gain market power and be able to increase their prices to us without
competitive constraint. In addition, the U.S. Postal Service, which is facing ongoing fiscal challenges, has
instituted postal rate increases and announced that it is considering closing thousands of local post offices and
ending Saturday mail delivery. While we continue to work with global carriers to offer our sellers a variety of
shipping options and to enhance their shipping experience, postal rate increases may reduce the competitiveness
of certain sellers’ offerings, and postal service changes could require certain sellers to utilize alternatives which
could be more expensive or inconvenient, which could in turn decrease the number of transactions on our sites,
thereby harming our business.
We have outsourced certain functions to third-party providers, including some customer support and product
development functions, which are critical to our operations. If our service providers do not perform satisfactorily,
our operations could be disrupted, which could result in user dissatisfaction and could harm our business.
There can be no assurance that third parties who provide services directly to us or our sellers will continue
to do so on acceptable terms, or at all. If any third parties were to stop providing services to us or our sellers on
acceptable terms, including as a result of bankruptcy, we may be unable to procure alternatives from other third
parties in a timely and efficient manner and on acceptable terms, or at all.
Our developer platforms, which are open to merchants and third-party developers, subject us to additional
risks.
We provide third-party developers with access to application programming interfaces, software
development kits and other tools designed to allow them to produce applications for use, with a particular focus
on mobile applications. There can be no assurance that merchants or third-party developers will develop and
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