KVH Industries (KVHI) Risk Analysis

We recorded substantial losses in each of the last five fiscal years (notwithstanding the income we recognized in 2022 from the sale of the inertial navigation business and in 2021 from the forgiveness of a PPP loan). Although our business was profitable in the fourth quarter of 2022 and second quarter of 2023, we may continue to incur losses as we face increasingly stiff competition. Our recent restructuring, workforce reductions and other cost-reduction measures may be insufficient to offset recent and accelerating reductions in our revenues. Recent inflation in the prices of goods and services, including wages, has also hampered our ability to improve profitability. In order to maintain and improve our competitive position, generate revenue and achieve sustained profitability, we must continue to grow our airtime subscriber base, reduce our bandwidth costs, and continue to introduce new and improved solutions. Our inability to accomplish any of these goals could have a material adverse effect on our revenues, profitability and cash flow, and we cannot assure you when, or whether, we will achieve sustained profitability.

The traditional geosynchronous satellite communications industry is experiencing significant disruption arising from customers' rapid transition to less expensive LEO services, including Starlink, as well as increased reliance on other forms of data transmission, including Wi-Fi and cellular data services. Like others in our industry, we are experiencing reduced demand for our traditional satellite communications services and products, which we expect will continue. Although we are adapting to this transition by becoming an authorized reseller of Starlink, OneWeb, and cellular data services and related products, there can be no assurance that we will generate the same level of revenue or gross margin from these sources that we derived from sales of VSAT airtime and related products. Moreover, our VSAT services require a separate infrastructure, which generates certain costs that are relatively fixed for a period of time. As customers transition away from VSAT services, our remaining VSAT services become less profitable and may eventually become insufficiently profitable to continue. If we are unable to efficiently operate both VSAT and LEO services and cost-effectively manage the ongoing transition to the latter, the expenses we incur may exceed associated revenues and thereby increase our losses.

Our ability to compete depends in part upon our patents, copyrights, source code, and other proprietary technology. The steps we have taken to protect our technology may be inadequate to prevent others from using what we regard as our technology to compete with us. Our patents will eventually expire and could be challenged, invalidated or circumvented. Customers or others with access to our proprietary or licensed media content could copy that content without permission or otherwise violate the terms of our customer agreements, which would adversely affect our revenues and could impair our relationships with content providers. In addition, the laws of some foreign countries do not protect our proprietary technology to the same extent as the laws of the United States, which could increase the likelihood of misappropriation. Any misappropriation of our technology could seriously harm our competitive position, which could lead to a substantial reduction in net sales. If we resort to legal proceedings to enforce our intellectual property rights, the proceedings could be burdensome, disruptive and expensive. The proceedings could distract the attention of management, and we may not prevail.

The mobile connectivity market is intensely competitive, and we expect the intensity of competition to continue to increase in the future. We may not be able to compete successfully against current and future competitors, which would impair our ability to sell our products and services. We are facing significant competition from companies that seek to compete primarily on price as well as new, emerging LEO services, such as Starlink and OneWeb, as well as future LEO services such as Kuiper, Telesat, and others. Competition from these sources increased dramatically in 2023 and 2024 and continues in 2025, leading to material reductions in our VSAT subscriber base. These companies may continue to implement price reductions and discounts for both products and services, which have required us to reduce our prices or offer discounts in an effort to prevent erosion of our market share. The majority of our customers have no long-term commitment and can switch providers without penalty. For example, AgilePlans customers are on month-to-month agreements. In the third quarter of 2024, we received and processed the anticipated service downgrade request from the U.S. Coast Guard, which reduces anticipated revenue from this customer for 2025 through 2027 by approximately 95%. As a result, we expect to generate substantially less revenue from the U.S. Coast Guard. For example, revenue from the U.S. Coast Guard declined from approximately $2.4 million in the third quarter of 2024 to approximately $0.6 million in the fourth quarter of 2024. Many current and future competitors have greater financial resources than we do, enabling them to operate at lower margins to gain market share. We believe increased competition contributed to the decreases in both our service sales and our product sales in 2024, including unit sales of our VSAT products, and we expect that this trend will continue in future periods. Some of our VSAT competitors have already leveraged partnerships amongst themselves in order to capture larger combined market share. Further, some of the companies that we depend on to supply us with capacity on satellite communications networks may vertically integrate by introducing their own products and services to compete with ours, which might motivate them to stop providing satellite network capacity to us, or to make it available on less favorable terms. Although KVH is a tier 1 reseller of Starlink terminals and services, we continue to face competitive challenges both from Starlink direct sales as well as from an expanding network of other Starlink retailers. A significant number of leisure customers have adopted Starlink systems for both two-way communications as well as streaming, which has impacted both our VSAT Broadband and TracVision satellite TV businesses. Although our leisure business accounts for less than 15% of our total revenue, competition from Starlink from various sources has had some adverse impact on our commercial business as well, particularly our growth in that segment and our overall VSAT subscriber base. While we did increase our subscriber count in the second, third and fourth quarters of 2024, spurred by an increase in subscribers for Starlink service provided by KVH, the total number of our subscribers declined in the third and fourth quarter of 2023 and the first quarter of 2024. If we are unable to sustain growth, it would have a material adverse effect on our revenue, profitability, and cash flow. In the marine market for high-speed Internet, voice, and data services, we have historically competed primarily with Marlink, Speedcast, Viasat/Inmarsat, and Network Innovations, along with smaller, single-hub regional services to deliver VSAT service. Additionally, we are facing meaningful competition from new LEO-focused providers such as SpaceX's Starlink and an emerging group of smaller providers, such as Clarus, Pivotel and Elcome. We also face competition from providers of low-speed data services, which include Viasat/Inmarsat and Iridium Satellite LLC. In the marine market for satellite TV equipment, we compete primarily with Intellian, Cobham satcom and Raymarine (Intellian-made). In the marine market for two-way communications equipment, we compete primarily with Intellian and Cobham satcom. In the markets for media content, the KVH Media Group competes primarily with Swank Motion Pictures, Baze Technology, and PressReader. Some of our competitors are well-established companies that have substantially greater financial, managerial, technical, marketing, personnel, and other resources than we do, which may help them to compete more effectively against us.

The gross margin percentage from our VSAT airtime services in some cases exceeds the gross margin percentage from other third-party products and airtime services. To the extent that the mix of airtime services we sell shifts away from VSAT services, our gross profit dollars will decline, perhaps materially, if we are unable to significantly increase revenue on non-VSAT airtime services, which will reduce our profitability.

The new presidential administration has introduced dramatic changes to the United States' approach to international trade, which may adversely impact existing bilateral or multi-lateral trade agreements and treaties with foreign countries. The U.S. has imposed significant tariffs on a wide range of foreign goods and may continue to increase tariffs or impose new ones, and certain foreign governments have retaliated and may continue to do so. We derive a majority of our revenues from international sales, which makes us especially vulnerable to increased tariffs. Unpredictable and shifting priorities in U.S. trade policy are generating significant turmoil in international trade relations, and it is unclear what future actions governments will or will not take with respect to tariffs or other international trade agreements and policies. For example, President Trump recently imposed tariffs ranging from 10% to 25% on an array of imports from Canada, Mexico and China. In response, these countries have imposed or announced intentions to impose retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports and other restrictions on trade with the U.S. It is unclear what further action the presidential administration will take with respect to tariffs. Ongoing or new trade wars or other governmental action related to tariffs or international trade agreements or policies could reduce demand for our services and products, increase our costs, reduce our profitability, adversely impact our supply chain or otherwise have a material adverse effect on our business and results of operations.

Our international operations subject us to a number of legal requirements, including the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the U.K. Bribery Act and the customs, export, trade sanctions and anti-boycott laws of the United States, including those administered by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Bureau of Industry and Security, the Department of Commerce, the Department of State, and the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the Treasury Department, as well as those of other nations. In addition, many of the countries where our customers use our services and products have licensing and regulatory requirements for the importation and use of satellite communications and reception equipment, including the use of such equipment in territorial waters, the transmission of satellite signals on certain radio frequencies, the transmission of VoIP services using such equipment and the reception of certain video programming services. These laws and regulations are continually changing, making compliance complex. We incur significant costs identifying and maintaining compliance with applicable licensing and regulatory requirements. Our training and compliance programs and our other internal control policies may be insufficient to protect us from acts committed by our employees, agents or third-party contractors. Any violation of these requirements by us or our employees, agents or third-party contractors may subject us to significant criminal and civil liability. Further, many of our commercial suppliers of satellite transmission capacity impose contractual obligations on us that permit them to suspend or terminate their provision of satellite services to support our network if we fail to maintain compliance with these laws and regulations. The loss of access to satellite capacity would materially and adversely affect our maritime communications service.