Thryv Holdings Inc

Overview

We are dedicated to supporting local, independent service-based businesses and emerging franchises by providing a cloud-based software platform, and innovative marketing solutions to the entrepreneurs who run them. Our company is built upon a rich legacy in the marketing and advertising industry. We are one of the largest providers of print and digital marketing solutions to SMBs and SaaS all-in-one small business management software. Our solutions enable our SMB clients to generate new business leads, manage their customer relationships, and run their day-to-day operations. As of December 31, 2023, we serve approximately 350,000 SMB clients through four business segments: Thryv U.S. Marketing Services, Thryv U.S. SaaS, Thryv International Marketing Services and Thryv International SaaS.

On April 3, 2023, Thryv New Zealand Limited, the Company’s wholly-owned subsidiary, acquired Yellow Holdings Limited, a New Zealand marketing services company (the “Yellow Acquisition”). In addition, on January 21, 2022, Thryv, Inc., the Company’s wholly-owned subsidiary, acquired Vivial Media Holdings, Inc., a marketing and advertising company with operations in the United States. Further, on March 1, 2021, the Company completed the acquisition of Sensis Holding Limited (“Thryv Australia”), a provider of marketing solutions serving SMBs in Australia (the“Thryv Australia Acquisition”).

The Company reports its results based on four reportable segments (see Note 17, Segment Information):

•Thryv U.S. Marketing Services, which includes the Company's print and digital solutions business in the United States;

•Thryv U.S. SaaS, which includes the Company's SaaS flagship all-in-one small business management platform in the United States;

•Thryv International Marketing Services, which is comprised of Thryv's print and digital solutions business outside of the United States; and

•Thryv International SaaS, which includes our SaaS flagship all-in-one small business management platform outside of the United States.

Thryv U.S. and International Marketing Services

Thryv's Marketing Services segments provides both print and digital solutions. The U.S. and International segments generated $510.5 million and $142.7 million of revenue for the year ended December 31, 2023, respectively. Our primary Thryv Marketing Services offerings include:

Print

•Print Yellow and White Pages. Print marketing solutions through our owned and operated Print Yellow Pages (“PYPs”), which carry “The Real Yellow Pages” tagline in the U.S. Domestically, we primarily publish PYP titles on a 15 to 18-month publication cycle, with the majority on an 18-month cycle. Internationally, we publish PYP and Print White Page titles on a 12-month publication cycle. We generate revenue by charging for advertisements placed within these titles.

Digital

•Internet Yellow Pages. Digital marketing solutions through our proprietary Internet Yellow Pages (“IYPs”), including Yellowpages.com, Superpages.com, Dexknows.com, and Extended Search Solutions (“ESS”) in the U.S. and Yellowpages.com.au, Whitepages.com.au, Whereis.com, Truelocal.com.au, Yellow.co.nz, Whitepages.co.nz, Finda.co.nz and Tourism.net.nz internationally.

◦During the year ended December 31, 2023, traffic to the U.S. sites averaged over 19 million visits per month across the three properties. We generate IYP revenue by charging SMBs for advertisements and priority placement.

◦During the year ended December 31, 2023, traffic to these international sites averaged over 5 million visitsper month across the eight properties. We generate IYP revenue by charging SMBs for advertisements and priority placement.

◦Our IYPs are efficient in delivering business leads. IYPs deliver leads at an attractive cost because consumers who search on IYPs are deep in the “purchase funnel” and are ready to buy.

◦We also offer ESS enabling SMBs to buy advertising on our network of owned and third-party directory websites, including Yelp, Nextdoor, and other popular sites. Our network delivers approximately 55 million visits per month. Our ESS network provides SMB clients expanded access to high-converting traffic at a low cost. We believe we are the only provider to offer this broad network of online directory sites with a single purchase.

•Search Engine Marketing. Search engine marketing (“SEM”) solutions that deliver business leads from Google, Yahoo!, Bing, Yelp, and other major engines and directories. Our SEM offerings leverage a mix of in-house and off-the-shelf technology to design ads, generate bids, and deliver reporting to advertisers. We track cost-per-click and cost-per-call metrics for our SMB clients, which gives them insights into the effectiveness of their ad campaigns.

•Other Digital Media Solutions. Other digital media solutions include online display and social advertising, online presence and video, and search engine optimization (“SEO”) tools.

Thryv U.S. and International SaaS

Thryv's SaaS segments are comprised of our SaaS offering Thryv®, our flagship all-in-one small business management platform (“Thryv Platform”), which consists of Command Center, Business Center, Marketing Center, ThryvPay SM, and Thryv Add-Ons.

•Command Center. Thryv Command Center, which launched in the third quarter of 2023, is an industry-first freemium offering that will be a core driver in the Company's product led growth initiative. Command Center enables SMBs to centralize all their communication through a modular, easily expandable, and customizable platform. Command Center allows an SMB to connect their pre-existing email accounts, Facebook and Instagram accounts along with installing Command Center’s WebChat client on their website, and using Voice over Internet Protocol (“VoIP”) in-platform telephony services along with Short Message Service (“SMS”) and video calls to provide a centralized inbox for all customer communication. Command Center uniquely not only combines all of these channels into a single inbox, but, through proprietary technology, stitches each of these channels into a single linear conversation per customer. So as a customer sends email, calls, and SMS to the business, utilization of Command Center means that the SMB sees all of these messages in a single conversation.

•Business Center. Thryv Business Center, formerly known as Thryv, is our flagship SMB end-to-end customer experience platform. Business Center is designed to allow a SMB everything necessary to streamline their day-to-day business, including customer relationship management (“CRM”), appointment scheduling, estimate and invoice creation, payments, document management, social media content, and online review management.

Our Business Center feature set mirrors the journey of a typical consumer, who begins on a search engine, reads business reviews, finds a company’s website and/or social media profiles, and clicks to set up an appointment or request information. After booking an appointment, the consumer typically expects an estimate and eventually an invoice, with the ability to pay online in an easy and efficient manner. This experience is then followed by prompts for reviews and referrals, along with periodic reminders and additional campaigns to generate repeat business.

Built on a customizable CRM database where businesses store customer information and then utilize a host of customer communication tools, Business Center helps SMBs communicate with their customers and manage day-to-day operations. It automatically updates and maintains client listings across the web so our SMBs’ online information is always correct.

We have a new, low cost and innovative engineering methodology. This methodology recognizes the large variety of bespoke SaaS solutions and back-end tools that are readily available. Thryv has chosen to utilize best-in-class systems and tools, to integrate them in unique ways that unlock value for the end customer. It is the combination of functionality from multiple platforms together that delivers value greater than each of the parts individually. Thryv maintains full control over the user experience, to deliver a modern and consistent user experience. When Thryv feels functionality is of strategic long-term importance, or it is not readily available in the marketplace, we leverage our internal engineering teams to create technology and innovation on top of the existing interoperable technology stack. Applications and/or features developed by our third-party developers specifically for our platform are not available outside of our platform on a stand-alone basis in the U.S., Canada, Australia, or New Zealand.

Business Center is sold on a monthly auto-subscription basis, which generates a recurring revenue stream. Substantially all of our clients subscribe to contracts with a minimum six-month upfront commitment, after which clients continue on a month-to-month basis. Clients can upgrade their service to a more feature-rich solution at any time as their business grows. We offer a variety of tiers, which we believe enables SMBs to choose the optimal features for their business. We believe the platform represents an attractive value for our SMB clients as compared to competitor products, such as single solutions or complex enterprise software systems that are suited to larger companies.

•Marketing Center. Thryv Marketing Center is a fully integrated next generation marketing and advertising platform operated by the end user. Thryv Marketing Center contains everything a small business owner needs to market and grow their business effectively, including easy to understand, artificial intelligence (“AI”) driven analytics. Marketing Center offers the following:

◦AutoID. Marketing Center connects prospects’ and customers’ digital interactions with the business and synchronizes these activities with the Thryv CRM records. This enables device level attribution so Thryv’s users know when and where a client found them for proper attribution on what works and what doesn’t;

◦Enhanced Online Presence. Marketing Center includes paid profiles on YP.com and Yelp.com, as well as a robust Google Business Profile Optimization service to ensure that the most viewed online profiles for the Marketing Center user stand out from the competition, get noticed, and drive results;

◦Omni-Channel Paid Campaigns. Marketing Center users can run paid advertising campaigns across Google, Facebook, Instagram, Yahoo Display, Connected TV, and Yelp all from a single interface. The user is able to allocate budget to their desire and increase, decrease, pause, or continue a campaign at anytime for any reason with full flexibility. All of the tagging, tracking and analytics are automatically configured to simplify the execution of these complex campaigns; and

◦Marketing Tools. Marketing Center includes additional marketing tools to help users optimize their online marketing efforts. These include a robust heat mapping tool to optimize and improve their website and landing pages based on visitor behavior, off-line call tracking phone numbers to track the efficacy of offline media efforts such as lawn signs or post cards. Marketing Center also includes a robust competitor watch to track the digital advertising activities of competitors to gleam ideas and work to achieve a competitive advantage.

Clients who also purchase Business Center can generate new business via Marketing Center and have these business opportunities automatically injected into their CRM system and enriched with additional data. These new business leads populate the client’s CRM database enabling our clients to email, text, call, or otherwise communicate with prospective customers via our Thryv platform.

•ThryvPay. ThryvPay, is our own branded payment solution that allows users to get paid via credit card and ACH and is tailored to service focused businesses that want to provide consumers safe, contactless, and fast-online payment options. ThryvPay is available to any user of the Thryv Platform, free or paid. ThryvPay offers the following:

◦Competitive Credit Card Processing Rates. ThryvPay offers a flat rate per transaction with no set-up fees.

◦ACH Payments Processing. Small businesses save money on a per-transaction charge, with the security of knowing immediately if funds are available.

◦Scheduled Payments. Service-based businesses that offer ongoing services or memberships can utilize our scheduled payments feature. ThryvPay also allows customized installment plans for pre-set specific dates.

◦Convenience Fees, Surcharges and Tipping. Small businesses can pass on optional convenience fees and/or surcharges, where allowed, for consumers who want to pay by credit card when presented with multiple payment options, often driving customers to pay by ACH methods, which generates significant savings for SMBs. ThryvPay also allows consumers to leave a tip.

◦Credit Card and Bank Account on File. Consumer information is stored in the small business’s Thryv account for future transactions, reducing friction for repeat business.

◦Real-time Reporting and Assistance. Thryv and ThryvPay integrates and auto-syncs with QuickBooks Online, Quickbooks Desktop, MYOB, Freshbooks, and Xero for accounting reconciliation. Thryv provides dedicated support for dispute and chargeback assistance.

◦Consumer Financing. ThryvPay includes a fully integrated partnership with Wisetack, a consumer lending platform that specializes in larger ticket, service based lending. This enables consumers of Thryv’s clients to apply for and pay their service providers utilizing financing. Thryv clients enjoy additional revenue by enabling larger purchases with additional convenience.

•Thryv Add-Ons. Thryv Add-Ons include AI-assisted website development, SEO tools, Google Business Profile optimization, and Hub by Thryv. These optional platform subscription-based add-ons provide a seamless user experience for our end-users and drive higher engagement within the Thryv Platform while also producing incremental revenue growth.

Integration of Marketing Services and SaaS

Our expertise in delivering solutions for our client base is rooted in our deep history of serving SMBs. We have worked for decades in our local communities, providing marketing solutions to SMBs. We found that SMBs need technology solutions to communicate with consumers who now do business via their smartphones. We launched our SaaS business in 2015 to provide SMBs with the resources to compete for today’s mobile consumers. In 2023, SMB demand for integrated technology solutions continued to grow as SMBs adapt their business and service models to facilitate remote working and contactless customer interactions.

In 2023, domestically, we delivered approximately 26 million PYP directories to strategically targeted American homes whose demographics indicate a higher propensity to use print marketing solutions.

We reach our clients utilizing a multi-channel sales approach that allows us to meet market demand through an extensive inside and outside sales force, channel partners, and targeted digital campaigns. Our nationwide field sales force allows us to have local and virtual interactions with SMB clients, which differentiates us from our competitors.

We derive a competitive advantage from our industry experience, sizable sales force, and our Thryv platform. Existing and potential SMBs have choices when selecting SaaS solutions. Numerous niche cloud-based tools are available for SMBs to self-provision online, and other providers market competing end-to-end solutions. Because the cost of entry into the SaaS space is relatively low, new entrants continue to emerge. Although we believe many of these solutions lack a comprehensive set of features and offer less onboarding and customer support, SMBs may opt for less expensive solutions or a package of solutions provided by less experienced entrants at a lower cost.

Our Solutions

Comprehensive Marketing Services Offering

We have a full portfolio of marketing solutions for SMBs, including PYP, IYP, SEM, and online display and social advertising, online presence and video, and SEO tools. This enables SMBs to craft a comprehensive marketing strategy with us as the one-stop provider. For example, PYP provides value to SMBs seeking to reach consumers who prefer traditional forms of print media. IYP helps efficiently position a client’s business on well-trafficked online directories, and SEM allows SMBs to generate customer traffic directly with ads on Google and other search engines.

Leading Presence in Print Advertising

As the largest publisher of print directories in the United States, we provide clients with insights into how traditional media can reach and advertise to a large segment of the consumer population. In the United States, PYP users tend to be over 55 years of age, more affluent and more likely to own a single-family home, resulting in higher sales conversion rates for our SMB clients.

Dynamic Tracking and Access to Unparalleled SMB Data

The effectiveness of each of our solutions can be measured with tracking software that enables SMBs to easily analyze the performance of their ad campaigns. We examine operational measures from various sources that help us understand how a client’s marketing services program is working, and we use these to monitor their effectiveness and performance. As a result, we give SMBs actionable insights to attract and retain new customers.

Enable SMBs to Deliver Customer Experiences That We View as Best-in-Class and Optimize Advertising Budgets and Business Leads Generation within One Platform

Command Center enables SMBs to centralize all their communication through a modular, easily expandable, and customizable platform. By combing their pre-existing email accounts, Facebook and Instagram accounts, along with installing Command Center’s WebChat client on their website, and using VoIP in-platform telephony services along with SMS and video calls, Command Center provides a centralized inbox for all customer communication, vastly improving the customer communication experience.

Our Business Center solution delivers many features relevant to SMB needs, including CRM, omnichannel email and text marketing automation, scheduling and appointment management, estimating, invoicing, payments, social media management, reputation management, document management and centralized customer communication. Thryv provides SMBs with a real-time 360-degree view of their customers and every interaction that each customer has with their business throughout their lifecycle.

Marketing Center provides robust solutions for SMBs to market and grow their businesses using a variety of automated digital tools and capabilities. Some solutions use machine learning to automatically choose the optimal mix of advertising solutions for each SMB to generate a tailored solution for it. Marketing Center offers full control and transparency on daily spend, allocations and channel by channel performance to the business owner who seeks to run advertising campaigns without learning or supporting multiple bespoke platforms, or incurring the hefty costs of an advertising agency. Marketing Center then automatically injects resulting leads and prospects into Business Center while enriching the basic consumer information with additional data. SMBs are then able to contact and engage new and existing customers.

Our Strategy

Continuous Innovation Drives Retention and Growth

In our Marketing Services business, we continue to improve the value of our solutions and leverage our extensive sales force to drive the retention of clients. For example, in our PYP business, we have simplified ad pricing, added colorful new local covers, and modified book formatting to make the books more useful and readable. Additionally, we increasingly renew digital (non-print) accounts through an automated process. In our SEM business, we have improved our bidding process, launched new features and boosted traffic from distribution partner sites. In our SaaS business, we continue to improve our Thryv platform by analyzing user behavior and client requests to expand the feature set and interoperability with other popular cloud-based tools. Annually, our product and engineering teams release over 300 improvements into the Thryv platform that improves usability, adds new functionality, and often creates additional revenue opportunities.

Transition into SaaS

Our plan has been, and continues to be, to develop and grow a profitable SaaS segment to better help SMBs manage their businesses, while maintaining strong profitability within our Marketing Services segment, which serves as an efficient customer acquisition channel for our SaaS platform. As a result, SaaS has been able to achieve profitable growth, and for the year ended December 31, 2023, generated 28.8% of our total revenue. In 2023, we made a strategic decision to accelerate the conversion of clients from digital Marketing Services solutions to SaaS solutions.

Leverage Our Nationwide Scale and Extensive Sales Force

We have one of the largest SMB-focused sales forces in the country within the marketing solutions and SaaS space, which we utilize to attract and manage our clients. We leverage our sales force to introduce our SaaS solutions to new prospects and existing Marketing Services clients through in-person, local as well as virtual, and online meetings to a dedicated SaaS demonstration and sales team. As of December 31, 2023, our efforts led to approximately 62% of our new SaaS clients originating from our Marketing Services segment. SMB demand for SaaS solutions continues to grow as SMBs increase their remote working capabilities and contact-less customer interactions.

Actively Manage Shift in Marketing Services Revenue Mix to Maintain Profitability

We continue to manage our Marketing Services offerings, some of which are in secular decline, notably print, to maximize profitability and extend the life of these solutions. Our cost management strategy includes using third-party printers and cost-effective long-term paper, printing, and directory distribution contracts.

Continued Cash Flow Generation and Selected Capital Allocation

We remain highly focused on methodically managing our assets, maintaining a highly variable cost structure, and building our SaaS business in a way to generate significant cash flow. We believe that our cash flow generation and strategic capital allocation will enable us to continue to reduce debt and pursue acquisitions to create value for our stockholders. We will continue to employ a disciplined financial policy that maintains our financial strength and favorable cost structure.

Opportunistic Acquisitions to Drive Synergy

The Company has experience executing accretive acquisitions in the industry. We believe we are well-positioned to continue this strategy to leverage our platform and scale in our industry. Historically, as a result of our acquisitions, we have realized significant cost synergies and obtained new clients that also bought our SaaS solutions.

International Growth

We continue to expand into international markets, which we view as a large opportunity for growth. We intend to penetrate international markets through acquisition, re-seller agreements, or other commercial arrangements. For example, in 2023, we completed the Yellow Acquisition to enter the New Zealand market, and in 2022, we began operations in Canada with our own sales force combined with a re-seller agreement. Additionally, in 2021, we completed the Thryv Australia Acquisition to enter the Australian market. Internationally, there are approximately 35 million SMBs in our target market.

Our Competition

Our industry is highly fragmented, intensely competitive, and constantly evolving. With the introduction of new technologies and market entrants, we expect the competitive environment to remain intense going forward. We believe the principal competitive factors in our segments are the following:

•customized, integrated, and tailored solution strategies;

•flexible technology that is compatible with third-party applications and data sources;

•quality;

•pricing;

•ease of use;

•brand recognition and word-of-mouth referrals;

•availability of onboarding programs and customer support; and

•nationwide and extensive, inside and outside sales forces.

We believe we compete favorably with respect to all these factors and that we are well-positioned as a leading provider of marketing solutions and cloud-based end-to-end customer experience tools to SMBs across the United States.

We face competition from other companies that provide marketing solutions and cloud-based SaaS tools to SMBs.

Marketing Services Competitors

In our Marketing Services business, we compete with numerous national companies that sell marketing campaigns on major national search engines and social media sites and build and host websites.

SaaS Competitors

In our SaaS business, we believe we compete with three general categories of competitors:

•Point Solution Providers. We compete with single-point solution providers across many features. Many of these products are low-cost and some have been in the market longer than Thryv.

•Vertical Solutions. Vertical solutions exist in many categories, including Home Services, Health & Wellness, Animal Services, Professional Services and Educational Services. Competitors have studied these categories and customized their products for the applicable category. These companies offer a tailored solution with a targeted appeal. Some also have consumer-facing apps that create demand for the SMB.

•All-In-One Competitors. Our most direct competitors are other all-in-one solutions. Several are priced above our price point or target larger companies with more employees.

Human Capital

Our key human capital management objectives are to attract the right talent, develop potential future and current talent for leadership positions, retain high performers and reward employees through competitive pay and employee benefits. We support these objectives with employee experience and culture initiatives aimed at making the workplace diverse, engaging and inclusive, while providing growth opportunities, internal leadership programs and diversity programs. In addition, we consistently monitor employee engagement through employee engagement studies and monthly surveys.

We employed 3,049 people as of December 31, 2023. Our workforce is comprised of approximately 98% full-time and 2% part-time employees. The majority of our employees are employed in our Outside and Inside Sales, Inbound Sales and Sales Operations, Client Experience, Operations, Information Technology, Billing and Print Directories departments.

Some examples of our key programs and initiatives intended to attract, develop and retain our diverse workforce include:

•Diversity and Inclusion (“D&I”). The Company’s Diversity Council provides a voice for our employees to leadership – to share insights, communicate with leadership, and generate ideas and actions to enhance and impact diversity and inclusion at Thryv. The Diversity Council plans and sponsors events to celebrate diversity and inclusion, educate and raise awareness, and create opportunities for networking and mentorship within diverse groups.

•Connecting the Dots Program: This is a new hire program where the Company shares information about Thryv’s culture, Company programs and discounts, communication tips within the Company, and more. The goal is to ease the new hire’s integration into the Thryv culture, right from the start, and make them immediately feel included in Thryv’s mission and programs.

•Accelerators Recognition Program. This program is designed to grow the connection and recognition of top performers who demonstrate our core values in their excellent performance. Our core values are:

•Client Devoted

•DONE3

•Act Like You Own the Place

•Invest in Our People

•Under Promise, Over Deliver

•Making Money is a By-Product of Helping People

•Think Long-Term; Act with Passion and Integrity

•Benefits. Among our benefit offerings, Virgin Pulse wellness programming has become a key motivator to good health and well-being. It is a user-friendly platform that encourages well-being, safety and performance, by providing friendly team-based competition, self-directed wellness journeys and incentives to build healthy habits and drive collaboration across Thryv. With 78% of employees enrolled on the platform and 61% of those enrolled actively engaged, the digital well-being platform has contributed meaningfully to our Work From Anywhere approach while creating connections and supporting a healthy lifestyle among our employees.

•Talent Development. We prioritize and invest in creating opportunities to help employees grow and build their careers through training and development programs. These include online and on-the-job learning formats.

•Our Emerging Leaders Program is designed to help identify and develop future leaders. Once identified, Emerging Leaders are provided focused leadership and management skill development programs – instructor-led, online and on-the-job.42 employees successfully completed the Emerging Leader program in 2023, resulting in 2 promotions into management – representing 5% of participants. The program continues into 2024 as we continue to positively support and grow leadership bench strength.

•Our New Manager Training Programis provided to newly promoted managers to develop and enhance their soft skills in people management. This program aims to set up newly promoted people managers for success while developing a network of colleagues to draw support and counsel.

•The Mindful Manager Programis designed to provide people leaders the opportunity to invest in their own development through quarterly online coursework. Courses are focused on elevated employee matters such as Leading with Emotional Intelligence, Mastering the Art of Listening, and Navigating Cross-Cultural Differences. Following completion of the coursework, leaders are invited to attend a Leadership Roundtable to discuss the assigned content and share learnings.

•The Tuition Assistance Program (“TAP”) supports the lifelong learning of all employees. Through a generous reimbursement program, we encourage employees to seek continuous education and personal development to support their career aspirations while contributing to Thryv’s collective growth and success. Eligible coursework may be aimed at the achievement of an Associate’s, Bachelor or Master’s degree or may be specialized in various certificate/certification programs. In 2023, we added language learning resources through Berlitz which have been well-received by employees globally.

•Culture Team. “Invest in Our People” is one of our core values, which we support with various initiatives.

•Our Thryv Life Channel (facilitated by Microsoft Teams) serves as our internal social media platform. The platform provides a vehicle to highlight personal and professional successes, share inspirational stories, publicize social opportunities, run “fun” employee-centric virtual events and generally connect our people. Engagement is high and continues to enhance the promotion of core values and relationship-building as we continually learn and grow in a Work From Anywhere environment.

•Learning Opportunities. To ensure we provide learning opportunities that enable us to adapt, belong and connect, we launched monthly “Lunch and Learn” sessions featuring a wide variety of employee-centric topics such as building one’s personal brand, communication skills, and other specific skill-building subjects.

•Culture Clubs are designed to purposefully drive connection and relationship-building across diverse work teams and individuals. Recognizing that the virtual workplace can be challenging for new relationship-building, the Culture Clubs offer meaningful opportunities to a broad group of employees to identify and join groups of colleagues with similar hobbies and interests.

•Virtual Onboarding. We are focused on virtually onboarding new employees through an enhanced virtual onboarding program. Video engagements, networking, a buddy program and social interactions are all included in properly onboarding a virtual employee while weaving core values and key job learnings into the programming.

Our Intellectual Property

The protection of our technology and intellectual property is an important component of our success. We rely on intellectual property laws, including trade secrets, copyright, patent, and trademark laws in the United States and abroad and use contracts, confidentiality procedures, non-disclosure agreements, employee disclosure and invention assignment agreements, and other contractual rights to protect our intellectual property. We possess certain intellectual property relating to Thryv®, Thryv Leads®, and our Marketing Services offerings, including but not limited to the following:

•trademark protection on brands, taglines, and products;

•proprietary roadmap and product stack with proprietary code;

•machine-learning algorithms and techniques;

•notice of allowance on a patent related to systems and methods underlying Thryv Leads, which processes include the coordination among our lead estimator tool, lead scoring systems, budget allocation systems, and the SMB’s CRM system;

•strategic alliances;

•branding via proprietary print and online assets; and

•copyright protections on work product.

We maintain a library of high-quality, proprietary communications, including:

•product features;

•customer FAQ's;

•our ideal client profile;

•website images and content;

•vertical industry templates and taxonomy;

•how-to-videos; and

•articles, blogs, and guides on using and competing with digital marketing.

In addition to the foregoing, we have established business procedures designed to maintain the confidentiality of our proprietary information, including the use of confidentiality agreements and assignment of inventions agreements with employees, independent contractors, consultants, and companies with which we conduct business.

Our industry is characterized by the existence of a large number of patents and frequent claims and related litigation regarding patents and other intellectual property rights. In particular, leading companies in the technology industry have extensive patent portfolios. From time to time, third parties have asserted copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property rights against us or our clients. Litigation and associated expenses may be necessary to enforce our proprietary rights.

Our Use of Technology

In Marketing Services, our print directories are published using a customized platform supported by our in-house engineering team. Our IYPs are managed by our in-house engineering team using proprietary software that we build and maintain. Other digital Marketing Services offerings are fulfilled in-house using third-party cloud-based software.

Our Thryv platform is comprised of unique integrations and solutions either built by Thryv or built for Thryv, and to Thryv’s specifications. In addition, we integrate with select third-party vendors who are managed by our in-house product and development teams. Thryv has chosen to utilize best-in-class systems and tools, to integrate them in unique ways that unlock value for the end customer. SaaS order processing and tracking, client engagement, client communications, and many other aspects of running the day-to-day SaaS business are performed using subscription-based third-party tools. When Thryv feels functionality is of strategic long-term importance, or it is not readily available in the marketplace, we leverage our internal engineering teams to create technology and innovation on top of the existing interoperable technology stack. We ensure that we retain intellectual property for the critical elements of the Thryv platform.

Government Regulation

We are subject to many U.S. federal and state and other foreign laws and regulations, including those related to privacy, data protection, content regulation, intellectual property, consumer protection, rights of publicity, health and safety, employment and labor and taxation.

Compliance with government regulations, including environmental regulations, has not had and is not expected to have a material effect upon the capital expenditures, earnings, or competitive position of our company. However, these laws and regulations are constantly evolving and may be interpreted, applied, created, or amended in a manner that could harm our business. See “Risk Factors — Legal, Tax, Regulatory and Compliance Risks” for additional information.