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UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549


Form 10-K

     
þ
  ANNUAL REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934
 
    For the Fiscal Year Ended December 31, 2002
 
or
 
o
  TRANSITION REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934
 
    For the transition period from           to

Commission file number 000-26679


Art Technology Group, Inc.

(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)
     
Delaware
  04-3141918
(State or other jurisdiction of
incorporation or organization)
  (I.R.S. Employer
Identification Number)
 
25 First Street
Cambridge, Massachusetts
(Address of principal executive offices)
  02141
(Zip Code)

(617) 386-1000

(Registrant’s telephone number, including area code)

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:

None

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act:

Common Stock, $0.01 par value with
Associated Preferred Stock Purchase Rights
(Title of Class)


      Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days.     Yes þ          No o

      Indicate by check mark if disclosure of delinquent filers pursuant to Item 405 of Regulation S-K is not contained herein, and will not be contained, to the best of registrant’s knowledge, in definitive proxy or information statements incorporated by reference in Part III of this Form 10-K or any attachment to this Form 10-K.     o

      Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is an accelerated filer (as defined in Exchange Act Rule 12b-2).     Yes o          No þ

      The aggregate market value of the voting stock held by non-affiliates of the registrant was approximately $70,516,000 based on the closing price of the registrant’s common stock on the Nasdaq National Market on June 28, 2002.

      The number of shares of the registrant’s common stock outstanding as of March 21, 2003, was 70,987,449.

Documents Incorporated by Reference

      Portions of the registrant’s proxy statement for its annual meeting of stockholders to be held on May 21, 2003 are incorporated by reference in Items 10, 11, 12 and 13 of Part III.




TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I
Item 1. Business
Item 2. Properties
Item 3. Legal Proceedings
Item 4. Submission of Matters to a Vote of Security Holders
PART II
Item 6. Selected Financial Data
Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations
Item 7a. Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk
Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data
Item 9. Changes in and Disagreements with Accountants on Accounting and Financial Disclosure
PART III
Item 10. Directors and Executive Officers of the Registrant
Item 11. Information About Executive Compensation
Item 12. Security Ownership of Certain Beneficial Owners and Management and Related Stockholder Matters
Item 13. Certain Relationships and Related Transactions
Item 14. Controls and Procedures
PART IV
Item 15. Exhibits, Financial Statement Schedules, and Reports on Form 8-K
SIGNATURES
Ex-10.5 Lease dated 10/6/99
Ex-10.6 First Amendment to Lease dated 12/30/99
Ex-10.7 Second Amendment to Lease dated 12/28/00
Ex-10.8 Third Amendment to Lease dated 12/22/00
Ex-10.9 Lease dated 3/19/01
Ex-10.15 Amended Offer Letter
Ex-10.18 Change in Control Agreement
Ex-10.19 Offer Letter
Ex-10.20 Securities Account Control Agreement
Ex-10.21 Second Loan Modification Agreement
Ex-10.22 Letter Agreement
Ex-23.1 Consent of Independent Auditors
Ex-99.1 Certifications of CEO and CFO


Table of Contents

ART TECHNOLOGY GROUP, INC.

INDEX TO FORM 10-K

             
Page

PART I
Item 1.
  Business     2  
Item 2.
  Properties     19  
Item 3.
  Legal Proceedings     19  
Item 4.
  Submission of Matters to a Vote of Security Holders     20  
PART II
Item 5.
  Market for the Registrant’s Common Equity and Related Stockholder Matters     21  
Item 6.
  Selected Financial Data     21  
Item 7.
  Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations     23  
Item 7a
  Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk     36  
Item 8.
  Financial Statements and Supplementary Data     37  
Item 9.
  Changes in and Disagreements with Accountants on Accounting and Financial Disclosure     68  
PART III
Item 10.
  Directors and Executive Officers of the Registrant     68  
Item 11.
  Executive Compensation     68  
Item 12.
  Security Ownership of Certain Beneficial Owners and Management and Related Stockholder Matters     68  
Item 13.
  Certain Relationships and Related Transactions     68  
Item 14.
  Controls and Procedures     68  
PART IV
Item 15.
  Exhibits, Financial Statement Schedules and Reports on Form 8-K     69  
SIGNATURES
Signatures     71  

      ATG, Art Technology Group and Dynamo are our registered trademarks, and ATG Scenario Personalization and ATG Data Anywhere Architecture are our service marks. This report also includes trademarks, service marks and trade names of other companies.

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PART I

 
Item 1. Business

Overview

      We develop and market software that enables consumer, retail and financial services companies to dynamically market, sell and provide services to their customers online. We offer proven, flexible online marketing, sales, and self-service software applications for consumer facing e-commerce sites. We also offer our clients related professional services including support, education and implementation services.

      Our applications are designed to help businesses gain information about their online customers and provide them the tools that enable them to build long-term relationships with their customers. In particular we believe that businesses want to optimize their consumer relations throughout the whole lifecycle of marketing to sales to post-sale services, whether online or offline. We seek to differentiate ourselves by designing products that make it simpler to develop and maintain user profile information across multiple complex data sources, easier to model and influence desired user behavior, and faster to develop and maintain dynamic web content with a smaller investment than otherwise possible.

      As of December 31, 2002, we had an installed base of more than 550 customers, with 52% in the United States, 42% in Europe and the remainder in other countries. Our principal target markets are Global 2000 companies, government organizations and other businesses that have large numbers of online users and utilize the Internet as a primary business channel. We have historically focused on providing our software and services to businesses in financial services, retail, media and entertainment, telecommunications, consumer products and services industries. We have delivered online solutions to companies such as Aetna Services, Alcatel, American Airlines, Barclays Global Investors, Best Buy, BMG Direct, Eastman Kodak, Ford Motor Credit, HSBC, J. Crew, Sun Microsystems, Walgreens, and Wells Fargo.

      We offer businesses software products and related services in three functional areas:

  •  Our marketing applications are designed to allow businesses to attract new customers, promote new offerings to existing customers, and improve the cost-effectiveness of existing marketing expenditures. Our clients use our tools to integrate their online marketing activities with related sales and self-service initiatives. Our tools are designed to allow businesses to increase marketing effectiveness by visually defining desired customer experience activities and events that will drive desirable customer behavior.
 
  •  Our online sales applications are used by our clients to facilitate transactions with consumers and our client’s channel partners. These commerce offerings are designed for the development of large consumer-facing e-commerce sites and channel partner extranets. We believe that using our online sales and marketing solutions together, our customers can create sophisticated promotions and offers that can drive incremental sales.
 
  •  Our self-service solutions are designed to decrease call-center service costs, to improve the speed with which customer needs are met, and to increase customer loyalty and satisfaction. We believe our self-service solutions become more useful through the use of our advanced personalization capabilities, that are designed to increase the likelihood that customer inquiries will be managed online avoiding the need for costly call center inquiry.

Our Strategy

      Our objective is to be the industry leader in providing consumer-based companies with software that integrates the whole customer lifecycle, from marketing and selling to service, including the automation of online and offline transactions. We intend to achieve this objective by implementing the following key components of our strategy:

  •  Focus on Commerce and Self-Service Applications. We believe the functionality and performance of our personalization and scenario servers historically have provided us with a significant differentiator for our products, and we plan to focus our enhancement efforts on these applications. In order to

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  enhance these applications we will seek to add additional functionality that we believe will drive higher customer satisfaction and greater reliability, usability and scalability. We also will seek to offer our commerce and self-service capabilities as Web services where practical, in order to help our customers extend their enterprises and generate new revenue sources and cost savings.
 
  •  Increase Penetration of Key Vertical Markets. We plan to focus our development and marketing efforts on consumer branded companies by developing complete solutions marketing capability that is specific to individual industries. These industries are characterized by complex transaction-oriented product offerings with sophisticated marketing needs. We believe that by optimizing our products to meet the needs of companies in these industries we can increase the benefits that we offer to these companies and in turn increase our revenues and market shares in the targeted industries.
 
  •  Support Open Application Server Infrastructure. We support the adoption of open application server infrastructure by our old and new customers. Our current product suite fully supports application server platforms from BEA Services and IBM, our two principal competitors in the platform market. We plan to work closely with BEA Services and IBM to increase the value both new and existing customers receive from our products regardless of the platform they select. We plan to further invest in careful integration of our most valuable product components with the development tools, application integration and portal infrastructure capabilities of these platforms.
 
  •  Continue Focused Marketing Initiatives. We are continuing to invest in promoting our company, technology, applications and solution sets through focused initiatives such as direct marketing, public relations, seminars, trade shows, speaking opportunities, web marketing, business alliance co-marketing, case studies, ATG Innovator magazine and the ATG Open User Conference. As we add industry solutions, we will develop complete solutions marketing capability that is specific to each industry we choose.
 
  •  Leverage Existing Sales Channels. We sell our products directly to end-users and through value-added resellers. In addition, approximately one-half of our product revenue is co-sold with a variety of business entities, including systems integrators, solution providers, technology partners and value-added resellers. We currently have a broad range of business alliances throughout the world, including large system integrators like Accenture, Cap Gemini Ernst & Young, EDS, Fujitsu Consulting, HP Consulting, and SAIC, as well as regional integrators such as Analysts International, E-Tree, Rikei, Thales-IS and SBI. Our goal is to maintain close relationships directly with our customers and to motivate systems integrators to implement our applications in their projects and solution sets.
 
  •  Leverage and Expand Service Capabilities. We have extensive experience in Web application development and integration services. Through our Professional and Educational Services organizations, we provide services to train our systems integrators, value added resellers and complementary software vendors in the use of our products and offer consulting services to assist with customer implementations. We seek to motivate our business allies and sales forces to provide joint implementation services to our end user customers. We intend to continue to seek additional opportunities to increase revenues from product sales by expanding our base of partners trained in the implementation and application of our products.

Products

      The market for our products is changing rapidly. When we first began to develop software products, many of the innovative and high performance elements of the application and development platform that we now use were not readily available in the market. We therefore had to create a high performance application server and many of the middle tier elements of our platform to provide for a building block style of rapid development, where one component makes use of the capabilities of another in an additive sense.

      Our product strategy has also long supported customer adoption of the whole ATG product platform as a highly reusable system of Web development components. Our customers apply high performance ATG technologies in the areas of transaction management, personalization, process modeling, and web development

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to go faster and further with their development activities at a much lower cost than is possible using comparable custom Web development methods. Inevitably, some of the innovative methods and technologies that once differentiated us are coalescing into industry standards and are being subsumed by capabilities offered by the major operating system and infrastructure vendors.

      Our products include the following:

        ATG Relationship Management Platform. The ATG Relationship Management Platform provides a rich set of features to enable online marketing, sales, and service solutions. The functionality of the ATG Relationship Management Platform provides businesses with insight into customer behavior and the capability to respond quickly to changing customer and market needs. The ATG Relationship Management Platform is distinguished from similar products by its robust data access capabilities -the “Data Anywhere Architecture”- and its means of modeling and responding to consumer behavior. We plan to build upon our marketing platform capabilities through a combination of internal development and external partnering and product sourcing.
 
        ATG Commerce. ATG Commerce offers a commerce solution for selling to business customers, channel partners, and consumers. Using ATG Commerce, companies can manage multiple phases of the end user lifecycle — marketing, sales, and service — while also leveraging our personalization functionality to more effectively manage relationships. ATG Commerce is built on an adaptable, flexible framework and our data access capability, and is sold bundled with the ATG Relationship Management Platform.
 
        Online Self-Service with ATG Portal. The ATG Portal offers rich relationship management and personalization features on a proven platform that includes tools for developing, deploying, and managing customer, partner, and employee portals. It features a set of application building blocks called “portlets,” pre-built sample applications, and a suite of administrative tools. ATG Portal is sold bundled with the ATG Relationship Management Platform.

      Customers from many industry segments can develop self-service applications using various combinations of the ATG Relationship Management Platform, ATG Portal, and ATG Commerce products. We plan to work with our customers and partners to further create industry solution frameworks from these successful customer-developed applications.

      Application Services:

      ATG Publishing. The ATG Publishing module provides a customizable workflow engine so that non-technical people can create, manage, preview, and deploy content while ensuring proper quality control. The publishing tools provide the means to create product catalogs, post updates to knowledge base articles, and design targeted e-mail marketing campaigns.

      ATG Search. Through our agreement with Autonomy, we offer powerful search capabilities that help customers, partners, and employees find the information they need, thereby lowering order abandonment, reducing call center costs, enhancing customer satisfaction, and increasing employee productivity.

      Our products are fully compatible with the BEA WebLogic Application Server, and the IBM WebSphere Application Server, and also run on our ATG Dynamo Application Server.

Services

      Our services organization provides a variety of consulting, design, application development, integration, training and support services in conjunction with our products. These services are provided through our Professional Services, Education, and Customer Support Service offerings.

      Professional Services. The primary goal of our Professional Services organization is to increase customer satisfaction with our application solutions. Our Professional Services include five primary service offerings:

        Structured Enabling Services. Working with a client or designated team, we offer Structured Enabling Services to facilitate project success. This is our preferred delivery model.

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        Packaged Offerings. We leverage the e-business expertise we have gained through hundreds of projects in order to offer a variety of packaged services to our customers. Packages range from services designed to help customers gain momentum with their portal or commerce project, to assessing the benefits of upgrading to the latest version of our applications and to technical implementation programs.
 
        Custom Solutions. We offer customized professional services solutions tailored to meet the specific needs of our customers across an entire project. Consulting services can include a combination of system architecture design, project management, web design, technical training and business consulting services.
 
        Express Services. Our Express Services offerings are short-term engagements designed to help our customers with a specific component of their project. Consulting services may consist of system architecture design, project management, web design, or technical training and support.
 
        Comprehensive Business Innovations. Our Comprehensive Business Innovations are full life cycle solution project services with an emphasis on deploying innovative, mission critical technologies related to our products.
 
        Education. We provide a broad selection of educational programs designed to train customers and partners on our applications. This curriculum addresses the educational needs of developers, technical managers, business managers, page designers, and system administrative personnel/ deployment engineers. ATG Education also offers an online learning program that complements our instructor-led training. Developers can become certified by completing the ATG Certified Dynamo Developer examination. We also offer end user training to complete the roll out of a customer’s application. We provide a full range of instructor-led and self-paced training solutions to assist customers with this key initiative.
 
        Customer Support Services. We offer five levels of customer support ranging from our evaluation support program, which is available for 30 days, to our Premier Support Program, which includes access to technical support engineers 24 hours a day, seven days per week, for customers deploying mission critical applications. Customers are entitled to receive software updates, maintenance releases, online documentation and bug reports, and technical support for an annual maintenance fee.

Customers

      As of December 31, 2002, we had an installed base of more than 550 customers. Our principal target markets are Global 2000 companies, government organizations and other businesses that have large number of online users and utilize the Internet as a primary business channel. Our customers represent a broad spectrum of enterprises within diverse industry sectors. The following is a partial list:

     
Consumer Retail Manufacturing


Best Buy Companies, Inc.
  Alcatel
Cabela’s
  Abbott Laboratories
Eastman Kodak
  Eastman Kodak
J. Crew
  General Motors
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia
  Newell Rubbermaid
Neiman Marcus
  Procter & Gamble
Restoration Hardware
   
Target Corporation
   
The Finish Line
   
Walgreens
   

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Financial Services Communication & Technology


A.G. Edwards
  Adobe
John Hancock Funds
  Alcatel
KeyBank
  BellSouth
Citibank
  EMC
Ford Motor Credit
  Handspring
Charles Schwab & Co., Inc.
  Hewlett Packard
HSBC
  Intuit
Barclays Global Investors
  Sun Microsystems
MFS Investment Management
   
Dreyfus Service Corporation
   
Merrill Lynch
   
Pioneer Investments
   
Zurich Scudder Investments
   
     
International Travel, Media and Entertainment


Benetton
  American Airlines
Kingfisher PLC
  BMG Direct
Direkt Anlage Bank
  Gameplay GB Ltd.
Pirelli
  Hilton Hotels Corporation
BBC Technology Service
  Hyatt
Philips
  Meredith Corporation
Heidelberger Druckmaschinen
  Nintendo
Lavazza
  Reader’s Digest
Roche France
  Sega.com
Premier Farnell
  Six Continents Hotels
Consignia
  Sony Online Entertainment Inc.
Sasol
  The MTVi Group
Vodafone
   

Technology

      We believe we are a technology leader in providing online marketing, sales and service applications due to our use of the Java programming language, our own strong component model, and our enterprise integration tools and methods.

      Java Foundation. Our products are written in Java and support Java programming for customization and extension, except for a few integration and installation modules that must be implemented in other programming languages. We have performed internal tests to certify that our ATG 6.0 Relationship Management Platform supports the current J2EE standards established by Sun Microsystems.

      We believe that our Java implementation results in the following benefits:

  •  STRONG COMPONENT MODEL. Java provides a component standard known as “JavaBeans,” which enables developers to segment their code into discrete, well-defined units which can be assembled in a “building block” fashion to create new applications. JavaBeans’ modularity makes it easier to create reusable software as well as maintain existing systems.
 
  •  PLATFORM NEUTRALITY. Java’s portability allows our applications to be run on virtually any major computer system without modification. This portability eliminates porting costs normally

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  required to support multiple platforms or to change platforms, while allowing us to release products on major platforms simultaneously.
 
  •  ENTERPRISE INTEGRATION. We believe that Java’s portability and direct support for distributed applications are helping Java to become the de facto standard language for enterprise system integration. We expect that Sun Microsystems’ establishment of J2EE standards will make integration even easier for those enterprise systems that support J2EE specifications.
 
  •  FEWER PROGRAMMING ERRORS. Java’s automatic memory management reduces memory corruption errors, which typically represent the most costly and difficult software “bugs” in conventional compiled languages such as C or C++.
 
  •  ACCELERATED DEVELOPMENT. We believe that the above features, combined with the broad availability of high-quality Java development tools, result in faster development time.

      Modular, Standards-Based Component Architecture. One of the key features of our product architecture is its high degree of modularity, achieved by building additional functionality on top of the JavaBeans component technology. Customizations and extensions built by our customers or partners using industry standard JavaBean components can be managed by our ATG Nucleus system. The ATG Nucleus system enhances the naming, configuration and lifecycle of each component, allowing components to be added, extended, duplicated or replaced without recompilation of the rest of the system. The modularity of our component technology allows our products to be adapted to meet future business needs. In contrast, producers of non-modular products must try to anticipate and develop additional functionality at the time that they market their products.

      One of the most powerful uses of our component technology is to integrate our software with external enterprise systems. We provide reference implementations of integration components while enabling our customers and partners to easily replace our reference components with new components that provide the same function but integrate with their existing systems. We adhere to industry standards to enable our products to leverage technologies produced by third parties and to protect the development investments of our partners and customers.

Research and Development

      Our research and development group is responsible for core technology, product architecture, product development, quality assurance, documentation and third-party software integration. This group also assists with pre-sale, customer support activities and quality assurance tasks supporting the Professional Services group.

      Since we began focusing on selling software products in 1996, the majority of our research and development activities have been directed towards creating new versions of our products, which extend and enhance competitive product features. We continue to focus our efforts on developing new and innovative products, as well as integrating our products with external enterprise systems and third party application servers. Our research and development expenses were $21.7 million in 2002, $30.1 million in 2001, and $19.0 million in 2000. The systems we integrate with include relational databases, content management systems, search engines, and credit card payment servers.

Sales Coverage Model

      Our principal target markets are leading organizations with large constituencies who use the Internet as a primary business channel. We target these potential customers through our direct sales force and through channel partners, including systems integrators and other technology partners. We currently have approximately 160 business alliances throughout the world.

      We employ one group of sales professionals who are compensated based on product and services sales made directly to end-users and through business partners, and another group of sales professionals who are dedicated to recruiting, training, developing business plans and joint selling and marketing with business

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alliances such as system integrators and value added resellers. We train and assist our business partners in promoting, selling, deploying, extending and supporting our products. The objective of this strategy is to establish close product relationships directly with our customers and to motivate systems integrators to adopt the ATG suite of products for commerce and self-service projects for their clients.

      Our co-marketing relationships are with major hardware vendors, software providers, systems integrators and other consulting firms that serve the market for information system products and services. The objective of this co-marketing strategy is to assist our partners in creating demand for our products and extend our presence globally and regionally.

      Set forth below is a partial list of organizations with which we have selling and marketing relationships:

North America

Accenture

Analysts International
Autonomy
Bell Canada
Blast Radius
Cap Gemini Ernst & Young
ClearCommerce
CEI America
Covansys
Critical Mass
Documentum
EDS
Fujitsu Consulting

GTSI (Fed Government)

Hewlett Packard
IBM
Immix Technology (Fed Government)
McFayden Consulting
Meritage
Montage-DMC
NCR
RTGX (Fed Government)
SAIC (Fed Government)
SBI & Company
Sun Microsystems
TIBCO Systems
Unisys (Fed Government)

International

Accenture

Cap Gemini Ernst & Young
Dimension Data
EDB
EDS
E-Tree

ETC

Fujitsu Consulting
HP — Japan
Thales IS
Rikei

      As of December 31, 2002, in addition to offices throughout the United States, we had sales personnel located in Australia, Canada, England, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands and Sweden. Our revenues from sources outside the United States were $30.1 million, or 30% of total revenue, in 2002, $47.6 million, or 34% of total revenue, in 2001, and $37.6 million, or 23% of total revenue, in 2000. During the past year, we have established relationships with new international partners and have added key international accounts.

Competition

      The market for online sales, marketing and self-service software is intensely competitive, subject to rapid technological change, and significantly affected by new product introductions and other market activities. We expect competition to persist and intensify in the future. We currently have five primary sources of competition:

  •  platform vendors such as BEA Systems and IBM, who are also our partners;
 
  •  Microsoft, with whom we compete in commerce applications and, less directly, in the platform arena;
 
  •  commerce-oriented vendors, such as Blue Martini and BroadVision, which compete on various levels including portals and e-commerce;

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  •  commerce, marketing and self-service vendors such as Chordiant, E.piphany and Kana, which may or may not have a vertical industry focus; and
 
  •  in-house development efforts by potential customers or partners.

      We compete against these alternative solutions by focusing on online sales, marketing and self-service applications for consumer-facing businesses. We believe our solutions provide these companies with a rapid time to return on investment, attractive long-term total cost of ownership, a way to present a single view of themselves to their customers, the ability to improve the productivity and effectiveness of customer interactions, and the flexibility to adapt to rapidly changing and often unpredictable market needs.

      We seek to provide our customers with a rapid time to return on investment through strong out-of-the-box functionality for online sales, marketing and self-service built on a flexible, component architecture that is practical and cost-effective to customize. These capabilities can enable customers to get to market quickly in a manner that exploits their competitive advantages — which helps drive their return on investment.

      Our products allow companies to present a single view of themselves to their customers through our Data Anywhere Architecture. The Data Anywhere Architecture allows companies to easily access and utilize data in the enterprise regardless of the data storage format or location. The data can be leveraged in their native form without having to move, duplicate or convert them. By enabling these capabilities in a cost-effective manner, we believe our products can help companies protect their brand and keep their customers from becoming confused or frustrated — all of which positively impact customer satisfaction and loyalty.

      Our Scenario-Personalization is designed to help companies make each interaction with their customers more productive and effective. These personalization capabilities help ensure that consumers are presented with the most relevant information. By avoiding information overload, consumers are more likely to have their needs met through the low cost online channel — increasing the speed at which customer needs are met and decreasing the likelihood the consumer will use a more expensive channel such as a call center. Scenario-Personalization can also make interactions with consumers more effective for our customers. Scenario-Personalization allows a business user to visually design a sequence of behaviors that our customer would like to encourage a consumer to undertake — which can lead to a specific goal such as a site registration or transaction. Our Scenario-Personalization capabilities automatically monitor and encourage consumers to follow these pre-defined behavior patterns — enabling our customer to maximize the effectiveness of each interaction with the consumer.

      Finally, we believe the combination of our out-of-the-box functionality, our component architecture and the Data Anywhere Architecture helps companies that use our products to adapt quickly and economically to rapidly changing and unanticipated market needs.

      As described above under “Our Strategy,” we support the adoption of open application server infrastructure by our old and new customers and plan to work closely with other platform vendors to increase the value customers receive from our products regardless of the platform they select. We intend to focus our future development and marketing efforts on applications rather than our platform, and as a result we expect our business and operating results will be less affected by our competition with platform vendors such as BEA Systems and IBM. We cannot assure you, however, that open application server infrastructure will not result in increased competition, or other changes in the competitive landscape, in the market for applications.

Proprietary Rights and Licensing

      Our success and ability to compete depends on our ability to develop and protect the proprietary aspects of our technology and to operate without infringing on the proprietary rights of others. We rely on a combination of trademark, trade secret and copyright law and contractual restrictions to protect our proprietary technology. These legal protections afford only limited protection for our technology. We seek to protect our source code for our software, documentation and other written materials under trade secret and copyright laws. We license our software pursuant to signed license, “click through” or “shrink wrap” agreements, which impose restrictions on the licensee’s ability to use the software, such as prohibiting reverse engineering and limiting the use of copies. We also seek to avoid disclosure of our intellectual property by

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requiring employees and consultants with access to our proprietary information to execute confidentiality agreements and by restricting access to our source code. Due to rapid technological change, we believe that factors such as the technological and creative skills of our personnel, new product developments and enhancements to existing products are more important than legal protections to establish and maintain a technology leadership position.

Employees

      As of December 31, 2002, we had a total of 555 employees. Of our employees, 137 were in research and development, 176 in sales and marketing, 171 in professional services and 71 in finance and administration. Our future success will depend in part on our ability to attract, retain and motivate highly qualified technical and management personnel, for whom competition is intense. From time to time, we also employ independent contractors to support our professional services, product development, sales, marketing and business development organizations. Our employees are not represented by any collective bargaining unit, and we have never experienced a work stoppage. We believe our relations with our employees are good.

RISK FACTORS THAT MAY AFFECT RESULTS

      This annual report contains forward-looking statements, including statements about our growth and future operating results. For this purpose, any statement that is not a statement of historical fact should be considered a forward-looking statement. We often use the words “believes,” “anticipates,” “plans,” “expects,” “intends” and similar expressions to help identify forward-looking statements.

      There are a number of important factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those indicated or implied by forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include those discussed below, as well as those discussed elsewhere in this annual report.

Risks Related To Our Business

We may not be able to sustain or increase our revenue or attain profitability on a quarterly or annual basis.

      We incurred a loss in each quarter of fiscal 2002. As of December 31, 2002, we had an accumulated deficit of $199.9 million. Our revenues decreased 28% to $101.5 million in 2002 from $140.3 million in 2001. In addition, we believe the current economic downturn within the software industry could continue to have an adverse effect on demand for our products and services, and therefore adversely affect our revenues as well. Because we have a limited operating history, and operate in a rapidly evolving industry, we have difficulty predicting our future operating results and we cannot be certain that our revenues will grow or our expenses will decrease at rates that will allow us to achieve profitability on a quarterly or annual basis. Additionally, the slowdown in the software industry and the decrease in spending by companies in our target markets have reduced the rate of growth of the Internet as a channel for consumer branded retail and financial services companies. If current economic conditions continue for an extended period of time or worsen, we may experience additional adverse effects on our revenue, net income and cash flows.

If we are unable to reduce our lease obligations, we will incur significant cash expenditures that may impact our cash resources.

      We currently have significant lease payment obligations related to our property lease agreements in numerous jurisdictions. We have engaged in ongoing negotiations with our landlords in an effort to reduce these costs with limited success. These negotiations have included attempts to reduce payments on occupied premises and efforts to negotiate buyouts of existing leases on unoccupied premises. We cannot assure you that these activities will be implemented without delay, if ever. In addition, we are currently engaged in litigation over leased premises in Germany as described in Item 3. Legal Proceedings. We cannot assure you that we will not be subject to additional legal proceedings related to our leases. If we are unable to reduce our

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lease obligations, we will incur significant cash expenditures, which will decrease our cash reserves and may divert cash resources that we intend to utilize in implementing our business strategy.

We expect our revenues and operating results to fluctuate, and the price of our common stock could fall if quarterly results are lower than the expectations of securities analysts.

      Our revenues and operating results are likely to vary significantly from quarter to quarter. If our quarterly results fall below our expectations and those of securities analysts, the price of our common stock could fall. A number of factors are likely to cause variations in our operating results, including:

  •  fluctuating economic conditions, particularly as they affect our customers’ willingness to implement new e-commerce solutions;
 
  •  the timing of sales of our products and services;
 
  •  the timing of customer orders and product implementations;
 
  •  delays in introducing new products and services;
 
  •  increased expenses, whether related to sales and marketing, product development or administration;
 
  •  the mix of revenues derived from products and services;
 
  •  timing of hiring and utilization of services personnel;
 
  •  cost overruns related to fixed-price services projects;
 
  •  the mix of domestic and international sales; and
 
  •  costs related to possible acquisitions of technologies or businesses.

      Accordingly, we believe that quarter-to-quarter comparisons of our operating results are not necessarily meaningful. The results of one or a series of quarters should not be relied upon as an indication of our future performance.

We may encounter disruptions to our operations or sales as a result of turnover in management and/or our sales force.

      Members of our senior management team, including our two founders, our former Chief Executive Officer and President and other senior managers, have left us during the past two years for a variety of reasons and we cannot assure you that there will not be additional departures. Key members of the current management team, including Robert Burke, our Chief Executive Officer and President who joined us in December 2002, have had limited experience working together and may be unsuccessful in developing or executing on a business strategy for us. These changes in management, and any future similar changes, may be disruptive to our operations. An important part of our total compensation program for management includes stock options. The volatility or lack of positive performance of our stock price may from time to time adversely affect our ability to retain our management team.

      In addition, we continue to rely heavily on our direct sales force. We have recently restructured and reduced the size of our sales force. Changes in the structure of the sales force have generally resulted in temporary lack of focus and reduced productivity.

Our lengthy sales cycle makes it difficult to predict our quarterly results.

      Our long sales cycle, which can range from several weeks to several months or more, makes it difficult to predict the quarter in which sales may occur. We have a long sales cycle because we generally need to educate potential customers regarding the use and benefits of our products and services. Our sales cycle varies depending on the size and type of customer contemplating a purchase and whether we have conducted business with a potential customer in the past. In addition, we believe the current economic downturn in the

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United States has increased the average length of our sales cycle as customers have deferred implementing new e-commerce solutions.

      We may incur significant sales and marketing expenses in anticipation of licensing our products, and if we do not achieve the level of revenues we expected, our operating results will suffer and our stock price may decline. These potential customers frequently need to obtain approvals from multiple decision makers prior to making purchase decisions. Delays in sales could cause significant variability in our revenues and operating results for any particular period.

      Competition could materially and adversely affect our ability to obtain revenues from license fees from new or existing customers and professional services revenues from existing customers. Further, competitive pressures could require us to reduce the price of our software products. In either case, our business, operating results and financial condition would be materially and adversely affected.

The market for Internet online marketing, sales, and service applications is intensely competitive, and we expect competition to intensify in the future.

      The market for online marketing, sales and services applications is intensely competitive, and we expect competition to intensify in the future. This level of competition could reduce our revenues and result in increased losses or reduced profits. Our primary competition currently comes from in-house development efforts by potential customers or partners, as well as from other vendors of Web-based application software. We currently compete with Internet application software vendors such as BroadVision. We also compete with platform application server products and vendors such as BEA Systems, IBM’s Websphere products, and Microsoft, among others. In addition, we compete indirectly with portal software vendors such as Vignette (through their acquisition of Epicentric), SAP Portals, a subsidiary of SAP, and Plumtree and customer relationship management vendors such as Siebel and Peoplesoft.

      Many of our competitors have longer operating histories and significantly greater financial, technical, marketing and other resources than we do, and may be able to respond more quickly to new or changing opportunities, technologies and customer requirements. Also, many current and potential competitors have greater name recognition and more extensive customer bases that they can use to gain market share. These competitors may be able to undertake more extensive promotional activities, adopt more aggressive pricing policies and offer more attractive terms to purchasers than we can. Moreover, our current and potential competitors, such as Microsoft, may bundle their products in a manner that may discourage users from purchasing our products. In addition, current and potential competitors have established or may establish cooperative relationships among themselves or with third parties to enhance their products and expand their markets. Accordingly, new competitors or alliances among competitors may emerge and rapidly acquire significant market share.

      Competition could materially and adversely affect our ability to obtain revenues from license fees from new or existing customers and professional services revenue from existing customers. Further, competitive pressures could require us to reduce the price of our software products. In either case, our business, operating results and financial condition would be materially and adversely affected.

If we fail to maintain our existing customer base, our ability to generate revenues will be harmed.

      Historically, we have derived a significant portion of our revenues from existing customers that purchase our support and maintenance services and enhanced versions of our products. Retention of our existing customer base requires that we provide high levels of customer service and product support in order to help our customers maximize the benefits that they derive from our products. In order to compete, we must introduce enhancements and new versions of our products that provide additional functionality. Further, we must manage the transition from our older products so as to minimize the disruption to our customers caused by such migration and integration with the customers’ information technology platform. If we are unable to continue to obtain significant revenues from our existing customer base, our ability to grow our business would be harmed and our competitors could achieve greater market share.

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We depend on our relationships with systems integrators.

      Since our potential customers often rely on third-party systems integrators to develop, deploy and manage Web sites for conducting commerce on the Internet, we cultivate relationships with systems integrators in order to encourage them to support our products. If we do not adequately train a sufficient number of systems integrators or if systems integrators were to devote their efforts to integrating or co-selling different products, our revenues could be reduced and our operating results could be harmed.

We depend on our relationships with value added resellers.

      We license products through value added resellers and encourage them to service and support our products. In we are unable to find qualified resellers, are unable to convince qualified resellers to license our products to end users, fail to adequately train a sufficient number of resellers or if resellers choose to devote their efforts to reselling our competitor’s products, our revenues could be reduced and our operating results could be harmed.

Competition with our resellers could limit our sales opportunities and jeopardize these relationships.

      We sell products through resellers and original equipment manufacturers. In some instances, we target our direct selling efforts toward markets that are also served by some of these partners. This competition may limit our ability to sell our products and services directly in these markets and may jeopardize, or result in the termination of, these relationships.

We could incur substantial costs protecting our intellectual property from infringement or defending against a claim of infringement.

      Our professional services often involve the development of custom software applications for specific customers. In some cases, customers retain ownership or impose restrictions on our ability to use the technologies developed from these projects. Issues relating to the ownership of software can be complicated, and disputes could arise that affect our ability to resell or reuse applications we develop for customers.

      We seek to protect the source code for our proprietary software both as a trade secret and as a copyrighted work. However, because we make the source code available to some customers, third parties may be more likely to misappropriate it. Our policy is to enter into confidentiality agreements with our employees, consultants, vendors and customers and to control access to our software, documentation and other proprietary information. Despite these precautions, it may be possible for someone to copy our software or other proprietary information without authorization or to develop similar software independently.

      In recent years, there has been significant litigation in the United States involving patents and other intellectual property rights. We could incur substantial costs to prosecute or defend any intellectual property litigation. If we sue to enforce our rights, the litigation would be expensive, would divert management resources and may not prevent other parties from using our intellectual property without our permission. In February 2000, we settled a lawsuit filed by BroadVision, which alleged that we were infringing on a patent for a method of conducting e-commerce. As part of the settlement, we agreed to pay BroadVision a total of $15.0 million in license fees over a three-year period, which was completed as of December 31, 2002.

      Despite our efforts to protect our proprietary rights, unauthorized parties may attempt to copy aspects of our products or to obtain and use information that we regard as proprietary. Policing unauthorized use of our products is difficult and while we are unable to determine the extent to which piracy of our software exists, software piracy can be expected to be a persistent problem. Litigation may be necessary in the future to enforce our intellectual property rights, to protect our trade secrets, to determine the validity and scope of the proprietary rights of others or to defend against claims of infringement or invalidity. However, the laws of many countries do not protect proprietary rights to as great an extent as the laws of the United States. Any such resulting litigation could result in substantial costs and diversion of resources and could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition. There can be no assurance that our means of protecting our proprietary rights will be adequate or that our competitors will not independently

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develop similar technology. Any failure by us to meaningfully protect our property could have a material adverse effect on our business, operating results and financial condition.

      In addition, we have agreed to indemnify customers against claims that our products infringe the intellectual property rights of third parties. The results of any intellectual property litigation to which we might become a party may force us to do one or more of the following:

  •  cease selling or using products or services that incorporate the challenged intellectual property;
 
  •  obtain a license, which may not be available on reasonable terms, to sell or use the relevant technology; or
 
  •  redesign those products or services to avoid infringement.

If we fail to adapt to rapid changes in the market for Internet online marketing, sales, and service applications, our existing products could become obsolete.

      The market for our products is marked by rapid technological change, frequent new product introductions and Internet-related technology enhancements, uncertain product life cycles, changes in customer demands, coalescence of product differentiators, and evolving industry standards. We may not be able to develop and market or acquire new products or product enhancements that comply with present or emerging Internet technology standards and to differentiate our products based on functionality and performance. In addtion, we may not be able to establish strategic alliances with operating system and infrastructure vendors that will permit migration opportunities for our current user base. New products based on new technologies or new industry standards could render our existing products obsolete and unmarketable. For example, functionality that once differentiated our products over time has been incorporated into products offered by the major operating system and infrastructure providers. To succeed, we will need to enhance our current products and develop new products on a timely basis to keep pace with developments related to Internet technology and to satisfy the increasingly sophisticated requirements of customers. E-commerce technology is complex and new products and product enhancements can require long development and testing periods. Any delays in developing and releasing new or enhanced products could cause us to lose revenue opportunities and customers.

Our business may suffer if we fail to address the challenges associated with international operations.

      As of December 31, 2002 we had offices in Australia, Canada, England, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, and Sweden. We derived 30% of our total revenues from customers outside the United States for the year ending December 31, 2002. In December 2002, we initiated a restructuring plan, which included the closing of our offices in Australia, Canada, and the Netherlands at varying times during the first quarter of 2003. Our operations outside North America are subject to additional risks, including:

  •  changes in regulatory requirements, exchange rates, tariffs and other barriers;
 
  •  longer payment cycles and problems in collecting accounts receivable;
 
  •  political and economic instability;
 
  •  difficulties in managing systems integrators and technology partners;
 
  •  difficulties in staffing and managing foreign subsidiary operations;
 
  •  differing technology standards;
 
  •  difficulties and delays in translating products and product documentation into foreign languages;
 
  •  reduced protection for intellectual property rights in some of the countries in which we operate or plan to operate; and
 
  •  potentially adverse tax consequences.

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      The impact of future exchange rate fluctuations on our operating results cannot be accurately predicted. We may increase the extent to which we denominate arrangements with international customers in the currencies of the countries in which the software or services are provided. From time to time we may engage in hedges of a significant portion of contracts denominated in foreign currencies. Any hedging policies implemented by us may not be successful, and the cost of these hedging techniques may have a significant negative impact on our operating results.

Our software products may contain errors or defects that could result in lost revenues, delayed or limited market acceptance, or product liability claims with substantial litigation costs.

      Complex software products such as ours often contain errors or defects, particularly when first introduced or when new versions or enhancements are released. We began shipping the latest version of ATG 6.0 suite of products, in the fourth quarter of 2002. Despite internal testing and testing by customers, our current and future products may contain serious defects. Serious defects or errors could result in lost revenues or a delay in market acceptance.

      Since our customers use our products for critical business applications such as e-commerce, errors, defects or other performance problems could result in damage to our customers. They could seek significant compensation from us for the losses they suffer. Although our license agreements typically contain provisions designed to limit our exposure to product liability claims, existing or future laws or unfavorable judicial decisions could negate these limitations. Even if not successful, a product liability claim brought against us would likely be time-consuming and costly.

If we acquire other companies or businesses, we will be subject to risks that could hurt our business.

      We acquired Petronio Technology Group in May 2000 for approximately $1.2 million and Toronto Technology Group Inc. in July 2000 for approximately $12.0 million. These acquisitions did not produce the revenues and synergies we expected. We incurred approximately $5.3 million in restructuring charges during the year ended December 31, 2001 related to the write off of unamortized goodwill and the settlement of restricted stock in connection with these acquisitions. In addition, we also incurred additional restructuring charges during the year ended December 31, 2001 in reducing headcount related to the Toronto Technology Group Inc. acquisition.

      In the future, we may pursue additional acquisitions to obtain complementary businesses, products, services or technologies. An acquisition may not produce the revenues, earnings or business synergies that we anticipated, and an acquired business, product, service or technology might not perform as we expected. If we pursue an acquisition, our management could spend a significant amount of time and effort in identifying and completing the acquisition. If we complete an acquisition, we may encounter significant difficulties and incur substantial expenses in integrating the operations and personnel of the acquired company into our operations while preserving the goodwill of the acquired company. In particular, we may lose the services of key employees of the acquired company and we may make changes in management that impair the acquired company’s relationships with employees and customers.

      Any of these outcomes could prevent us from realizing the anticipated benefits of our acquisitions. To pay for an acquisition, we might use stock or cash. Alternatively, we might borrow money from a bank or other lender. If we use our stock, our stockholders would experience dilution of their ownership interests. If we use cash or debt financing, our financial liquidity would be reduced. We may be required to capitalize a significant amount of intangibles, including goodwill, which may lead to significant amortization charges. In addition, we may incur significant, one-time write-offs and amortization charges. These amortization charges and write-offs could decrease our future earnings or increase our future losses.

Our announced restructurings may not result in the reduced cost structure we anticipate and may have other adverse impacts on productivity.

      In January 2003, we announced a corporate restructuring involving a workforce reduction of approximately 125 people, or 23% of our workforce, which was focused in our professional services, general and

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administrative staff and internal sales and operations, and the closing and consolidation of office facilities in selected locations. These actions resulted in recording a restructuring charge of approximately $19.1 million, in the fourth quarter of 2002. In addition, we recorded a restructuring charge of $76.9 million in 2001 relating to previous restructuring activities. These restructuring activities require that we close facilities, maintain sales efforts and provide continuing customer support and service in regions where the sales and support staff has been reduced or eliminated, reallocate workload among continuing employees, and seek to reduce liability for idle lease space. The outcomes of such restructuring activities are difficult to predict. While we believe our restructuring and consolidation activities will reduce our cost structure, we may not achieve the cost reductions that we are expecting. In addition, our restructuring activities may result in lower revenues as a result of the decreased staff in our sales and marketing and professional services groups or other adverse impacts on productivity that we did not anticipate.

We use the Java programming language to develop our products, and our business could be harmed if Java loses market acceptance or if we are not able to continue using Java or Java-related technologies.

      We write our software in the Java computer programming language developed by Sun Microsystems and we incorporate J2EE, Java Runtime Environment, Java Naming and Directory Interface, Java Servlet Development Kit, Java Foundation Classes, JavaMail and JavaBeans Activation Framework into our products under licenses granted to us by Sun. Our ATG 6.0 Relationship Management Platform has been designed to support Sun’s J2EE standards. If Sun were to decline to continue to allow us to use these technologies for any reason, we would be required to (a) license the equivalent technology from another souce, (b) rewrite the technology ourselves, or (c) rewrite portions of our software to accommodate the change or no longer use the technology.

      While a number of companies have introduced Web applications based on Java, Java could fall out of favor, and support by Sun Microsystems or other companies could decline. Moreover, our new ATG 6.0 Relationship Management Platform is designed to support Sun’s Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition, or J2EE, standards for developing modular Java programs that can be accessed over a network. We have licensed the J2EE brand and certification tests from Sun. There can be no assurance that these standards will be widely adopted, that we can continue to support J2EE standards established by Sun from time to time or that the J2EE brand will continue to be made available to us on commercially reasonable terms. If Java or J2EE support decreased or we could not continue to use Java or related Java technologies or to support J2EE, we might have to rewrite the source code for our entire product line to enable our products to run on other computer platforms. Also, changes to Java or J2EE standards or the loss of our license to the J2EE brand could require us to change our products and adversely affect the perception of our products by our customers. If we were unable to develop or implement appropriate modifications to our products on a timely basis, we could lose revenue opportunities and our business could be harmed.

We may need additional financing in the future, and any additional financing may result in restrictions on our operations or substantial dilution to our stockholders.

      We may need to raise additional funds in the future, for example, to develop new technologies, support an expansion, respond to competitive pressures, acquire complementary businesses or respond to unanticipated situations. We may try to raise additional funds through public or private financings, strategic relationships or other arrangements. Our ability to obtain debt or equity funding will depend on a number of factors, including market conditions, our operating performance and investor interest. Additional funding may not be available to us on acceptable terms or at all. If adequate funds are not available, we may be required to revise our business plan to reduce expenditures, including curtailing our growth strategies, foregoing acquisitions or reducing our product development efforts. If we succeed in raising additional funds through the issuance of equity or convertible securities, the issuance could result in substantial dilution to existing stockholders. If we raise additional funds through the issuance of debt securities or preferred stock, these new securities would have rights, preferences and privileges senior to those of the holders of our common stock. The terms of these securities, as well as any borrowings under our credit agreement, could impose restrictions on our operations.

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Risks Related To The Internet Industry

Our performance will depend on the growth of e-commerce and self-service.

      Our success will depend heavily on the continued use of the Internet for e-commerce. The current United States economic downturn has reduced demand for our products as customers and potential customers delay or cancel the implementation of online marketing, sales, and service applications. If the market for our products and services does not continue to mature, we will be unable to execute successfully our business plan. Adoption of electronic commerce and online marketing, sales, and service applications, particularly by those companies that have historically relied upon traditional means of commerce, will require a broad acceptance of different methods of conducting business. Our future revenues and profits will substantially depend on the Internet being accepted and widely used for commerce and communication. If Internet commerce does not continue to grow or grows more slowly than expected, our future revenues and profits may not meet our expectations or those of analysts. Similarly, purchasers with established patterns of commerce may be reluctant to alter those patterns or may otherwise resist providing the personal data necessary to support our consumer profiling capability.

Regulations could be enacted that either directly restrict our business or indirectly impact our business by limiting the growth of e-commerce.

      As e-commerce evolves, federal, state and foreign agencies could adopt regulations covering issues such as user privacy, content and taxation of products and services. If enacted, government regulations could limit the market for our products and services or could impose burdensome requirements that render our business unprofitable. Although many regulations might not apply to our business directly, we expect that laws regulating the solicitation, collection or processing of personal and consumer information could indirectly affect our business. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 prohibits certain types of information and content from being transmitted over the Internet. The prohibition’s scope and the liability associated with a violation are currently unsettled. In addition, although substantial portions of the Communications Decency Act were held to be unconstitutional, we cannot be certain that similar legislation will not be enacted and upheld in the future. It is possible that legislation could expose companies involved in e-commerce to liability, which could limit the growth of e-commerce generally. Legislation like the Telecommunications Act and the Communications Decency Act could dampen the growth in Web usage and decrease its acceptance as a medium of communications and commerce.

The Internet is generating privacy concerns that could result in legislation or market perceptions that could harm our business or result in reduced sales of our products, or both.

      Businesses use our ATG Scenario Personalization product to develop and maintain profiles to tailor the content to be provided to Web site visitors. When a visitor first arrives at a Web site, our software creates a profile for that visitor. If the visitor registers or logs in, the visitor’s identity is added to the profile, preserving any profile information that was gathered up to that point. ATG Scenario Personalization product tracks both explicit user profile data supplied by the user as well as implicit profile attributes derived from the user’s behavior on the Web site. Privacy concerns may cause visitors to resist providing the personal data or avoid Web sites tracking the Web behavioral information necessary to support this profiling capability. More importantly, even the perception of security and privacy concerns, whether or not valid, may indirectly inhibit market acceptance of our products. In addition, legislative or regulatory requirements may heighten these concerns if businesses must notify Web site users that the data captured after visiting Web sites may be used to direct product promotion and advertising to that user. Other countries and political entities, such as the European Economic Community, have adopted such legislation or regulatory requirements. The United States may adopt similar legislation or regulatory requirements. If privacy legislation is enacted or consumer privacy concerns are not adequately addressed, our business, financial condition and operating results could be harmed.

      Our products use “cookies” to track demographic information and user preferences. A “cookie” is information keyed to a specific user that is stored on a computer’s hard drive, typically without the user’s

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knowledge. Cookies are generally removable by the user, although removal could affect the content available on a particular site. Germany has imposed laws limiting the use of cookies, and a number of Internet commentators and governmental bodies in the United States and other countries have urged passage of laws limiting or abolishing the use of cookies. If such laws are passed or if users begin to delete or refuse cookies as a common practice, demand for our personalization products could be reduced.

Risks Related To The Securities Markets And Our Stock

Our stock price may continue to be volatile.

      The market price of our common stock has fluctuated in the past and is likely to continue to be highly volatile. For example, the market price of our common stock has ranged from $.58 per share to $126.88 per share since our initial public offering in July 1999. Fluctuations in market price and volume are particularly common among securities of Internet and software companies. The market price of our common stock may fluctuate significantly in response to the following factors, some of which are beyond our control:

  •  variations in our quarterly operating results;
 
  •  changes in market valuations of Internet and software companies;
 
  •  our announcements of significant contracts, acquisitions, strategic partnerships, joint ventures or capital commitments;
 
  •  our failure to complete significant sales;
 
  •  additions or departures of our key personnel;
 
  •  future sales of our common stock; or
 
  •  changes in financial estimates by securities analysts.

We may incur significant costs from class action litigation.

      We currently are the subject of securities class action litigation. If a court awards damages to the plaintiffs, the total amount could exceed the limit of our existing insurance. This litigation also may divert management’s attention and resources. We may be the target of similar litigation in the future if the market for our stock becomes volatile. For a further description of the pending litigation, see “Item 3. Legal Proceedings.”

Anti-takeover provisions in our charter documents and Delaware law could prevent or delay a change in control of our company.