To help investors understand Trimble's past financial performance and future results, as well as its performance relative to competitors, Trimble supplements the financial results that the Company provides in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles, or GAAP, with non-GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP measures can be used to evaluate Trimble's historical and prospective financial performance, as well as its performance relative to competitors. The Company's management regularly uses supplemental non-GAAP financial measures internally to understand, manage, and evaluate the business, and to make operating decisions. These non-GAAP measures are among the primary factors management uses in planning for and forecasting future periods. Trimble believes that these non-GAAP financial measures reflect an additional way of viewing aspects of the Company's operations that, when viewed with GAAP results, provide a more complete understanding of factors and trends affecting the business. Further, Trimble believes some of the Company's investors track "core operating performance" as a means of evaluating performance in the ordinary, ongoing, and customary course of the Company's operations. Core operating performance excludes items that are non-cash, not expected to recur, or not reflective of ongoing financial results. Management also believes that looking at Trimble's core operating performance provides a supplemental way to provide consistency in period to period comparisons.

The method the Company uses to produce non-GAAP results is not computed according to GAAP and may differ from the methods used by other companies including industry peer companies, limiting the usefulness of these measures for comparative purposes.

Our non-GAAP results are not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for comparable GAAP measures and should be read only in conjunction with Trimble's consolidated financial statements prepared in accordance with GAAP. The non-GAAP financial measures included in the previous table as well as detailed explanations to the adjustments to comparable GAAP measures are set forth below: 

Non-GAAP revenue

We believe this measure helps investors understand the performance of our business, as non-GAAP revenue excludes the effects of certain acquired deferred revenue that was written down to fair value in purchase accounting. Management believes that excluding fair value purchase accounting adjustments more closely correlates with the ordinary and ongoing course of the acquired company's operations and facilitates analysis of revenue growth and trends.

Non-GAAP gross margin

We believe our investors benefit by understanding our non-GAAP gross margin as a way of understanding how product mix, pricing decisions, and manufacturing costs influence our business.  Non-GAAP gross margin excludes the effects of purchase accounting adjustments to certain acquired deferred revenue, amortization of purchased intangible assets, acquisition/divestiture items, stock-based compensation, deferred compensation, and restructuring and other costs.  We believe that these adjustments offer investors additional information that may be useful to view trends in our gross margin performance.

Non-GAAP operating expenses

We believe this measure is important to investors evaluating our non-GAAP spending in relation to revenue.  Non-GAAP operating expenses exclude the effects of purchase accounting adjustments to certain acquired capitalized commissions that were eliminated in purchase accounting, amortization of purchased intangible assets, acquisition/divestiture items, stock-based compensation, deferred compensation, and restructuring and other costs.  We believe that these adjustments offer investors supplemental information to facilitate comparison of our operating expenses to our prior results and trends.

Non-GAAP operating income       

We believe our investors benefit by understanding our non-GAAP operating income trends, which are driven by revenue, gross margin, and spending.  Non-GAAP operating income excludes the effects of purchase accounting adjustments to certain acquired deferred revenue and acquired capitalized commissions, amortization of purchased intangible assets, acquisition/divestiture items, stock-based compensation, deferred compensation, and restructuring and other costs.  We believe that these adjustments offer a supplemental means for our investors to evaluate current operating performance compared to prior results and trends.

Non-GAAP non-operating expense, net       

We believe this measure helps investors evaluate our non-operating income trends.  Non-GAAP non-operating expense, net, excludes acquisition/divestiture items and deferred compensation.  We believe that these exclusions provide investors with a supplemental view of our ongoing financial results.

Non-GAAP income tax provision

We believe this measure helps investors because it provides for consistent treatment of excluded items in our non-GAAP presentation and a difference in the GAAP and non-GAAP tax rates.  The non-GAAP tax rate excludes charges and benefits such as net deferred tax impacts results from the non-U.S. intercompany transfer of intellectual property, tax law changes, and significant one-time reserve releases upon statute of limitations expirations.

Non-GAAP net income

This measure provides a supplemental view of net income trends, which are driven by non-GAAP income before taxes and our non-GAAP tax rate.  Non-GAAP net income excludes the effects of purchase accounting adjustments to certain acquired deferred revenue and acquired capitalized commissions, amortization of purchased intangible assets, acquisition/divestiture items, stock-based compensation, restructuring and other costs, and non-GAAP tax adjustments.  We believe our investors benefit from understanding these adjustments and from an alternative view of our net income performance as compared to prior periods and trends.

Non-GAAP diluted net income per share

We believe our investors benefit by understanding our non-GAAP operating performance as reflected in a per share calculation as a way of measuring non-GAAP operating performance by ownership in the company.  Non-GAAP diluted net income per share excludes the effects of purchase accounting adjustments to certain acquired deferred revenue and acquired capitalized commissions, amortization of purchased intangible assets, acquisition/divestiture items, stock-based compensation, restructuring and other costs, and non-GAAP tax adjustments.  We believe that these adjustments offer investors a useful view of our diluted net income per share as compared to our prior periods and trends.

Adjusted EBITDA

Adjusted EBITDA is a performance measure that we believe offers a useful view of the overall operations of our business by removing potential differences caused by variations unrelated to operating performance, such as capital structures (interest expense), income taxes, depreciation and amortization expenses.  We define Adjusted EBITDA as non-GAAP operating income plus depreciation expense, and income from equity method investments, net.  Other companies may define Adjusted EBITDA differently.  Adjusted EBITDA is not intended to purport to be an alternative to net income or operating income as a measure of operating performance or to cash flow from operating activities as a measure of liquidity.

These non-GAAP measures can be used to evaluate our historical and prospective financial performance, as well as our performance relative to competitors. We believe some of our investors track our "core operating performance" as a means of evaluating our performance in the ordinary, ongoing, and customary course of our operations. Core operating performance excludes items that are non-cash, not expected to recur, or not reflective of ongoing financial results. Management also believes that looking at our core operating performance provides a supplemental way to provide consistency in period to period comparisons. Accordingly, management excludes from non-GAAP the effects of purchase accounting adjustments to certain acquired deferred revenue and acquired capitalized commissions, amortization of purchased intangible assets, acquisition/divestiture items, stock-based compensation, deferred compensation, restructuring and other costs, and non-GAAP tax adjustments.

(A)  Acquired deferred revenue adjustment.  Purchase accounting generally requires us to write-down acquired deferred revenue to fair value. Our GAAP revenue includes the fair value impact from purchase accounting for post-contract support and subscriptions contracts assumed in connection with our acquisitions.  The non-GAAP adjustment to our revenue is intended to reflect the full amount of such revenue.  We believe this adjustment is useful to investors as a measure of the ongoing performance of our business and facilitates analysis of revenue growth and business trends.

(B)  Amortization of acquired capitalized commissions.  Purchase accounting generally requires us to eliminate capitalized sales commissions balances as of the acquisition date.  Our GAAP sales and marketing expenses generally do not reflect the amortization of these capitalized sales commissions balances. The non-GAAP adjustment to increase our sales and marketing expenses is intended to reflect the full amount of amortization related to such balances as though the acquired companies operated independently in the periods presented.  We believe this adjustment to sales and marketing expenses is useful to investors as a measure of the ongoing performance of our business.  

(C)  Amortization of purchased intangible assets.  Included in our GAAP presentation of cost of sales and operating expenses is amortization of purchased intangible assets. We believe that by excluding the amortization of purchased intangible assets, which primarily represents technology and/or customer relationships already developed, this provides an alternative way for investors to compare our operations pre-acquisition to those post-acquisition and to those of our competitors that have pursued internal growth strategies.  However, we note that companies that grow internally will incur costs to develop intangible assets that will be expensed in the period incurred, which may make a direct comparison more difficult.