Montrose Environmental Group (MEG) Risk Analysis

We and our clients are subject to claims, litigation and regulatory proceedings in the normal course of business and could become subject to additional claims in the future, some of which could be material. In addition to those claims discussed in greater detail elsewhere in "-Risks Related to Our Business and Industry," we have been, and may in the future be, subject to claims involving labor and employment, anti-discrimination, commercial disputes and other matters. We may also be exposed to potential claims arising from the conduct of our employees for which we may be liable. In addition, in the normal course of our business, we are required to make professional judgments and recommendations about environmental conditions of project sites for our clients, and we may be subject to claims that we are responsible for these judgments and recommendations if they are later found to be inaccurate. Claims and proceedings, whether or not they have merit and regardless of the outcome, are typically expensive and can divert the attention of management and other personnel and require the commitment of significant resources for extended periods of time. Additionally, claims and proceedings can impact client confidence and the general public's perception of our company and services and solutions, even if the underlying assertions are proven to be false. The outcomes of litigation and similar disputes are often difficult to reliably predict and may result in decisions or settlements that are contrary to or in excess of our expectations and losses may exceed our reserves. Any claims or proceedings, particularly those in which we are unsuccessful or for which we did not establish adequate reserves, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

We are subject to taxation in, and to the tax laws and regulations of, multiple jurisdictions, including non-U.S. jurisdictions as a result of the expansion of our international operations and our corporate entity structure. We are also subject to transfer pricing laws with respect to our intercompany transactions. Adverse developments in tax laws or regulations, or any change in position regarding the application, administration or interpretation thereof, in any applicable jurisdiction, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition or results of operations. In addition, the tax authorities in any applicable jurisdiction may disagree with the positions we have taken or intend to take regarding the tax treatment or characterization of any of our transactions. If any applicable tax authorities were to successfully challenge the tax treatment or characterization of any of our transactions, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition or results of operations. In addition, our tax obligations and effective tax rates could be adversely affected by recognizing tax losses or lower than anticipated earnings in jurisdictions where we have lower statutory rates and higher than anticipated earnings in jurisdictions where we have higher statutory rates, varying tax rates in the different jurisdictions in which we operate, changes in foreign currency exchange rates or changes in the valuation of our deferred tax assets and liabilities.

Certain of our environmental solutions include product or system offerings, including those offered by ECT2 and our biogas division. We have a limited history in offering products and designing and building systems as compared to the services we offer, and this expansion subjects us to new and different risks generally associated with offering products manufactured by third parties, including but not limited to: - production difficulties of third-party manufacturers, including problems involving changes in their production capacity and yields, quality control and assurance, component supply and shortages of qualified personnel;- failure to establish or maintain supplier relationships;- supply chain issues of third-party manufacturers and the failure of suppliers to produce components to specification or supply us with a sufficient amount or adequate quality of materials;- increases in the cost of raw materials, components or the overall cost of production passed to us;- failure to adequately design new or improved products or respond to changing regulatory requirements;- use of defective materials or workmanship in the manufacturing process;- improper use of our products;- failure to satisfy any warranty or performance guarantee;- product liability claims; and - lack of market acceptance, delays in product development and failure of products to operate properly. Under any of these circumstances, demand may suffer, we may incur substantial expense to remedy the problem, may incur penalties under the customer agreement and may be required to obtain replacement products if available. If we fail to remedy any such problem in a timely manner, we risk the loss of revenue resulting from the inability to sell those products or systems and related increased costs. If product or system defects or other issues are not discovered until after they are purchased by our clients, our clients could lose confidence in our products and our brand and reputation may be negatively impacted. Any failure to successfully respond to the foregoing risks or any others that we may not appreciate as a result of our limited history of production could have material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

The assessment, permitting and response, measurement and analysis and remediation and reuse industries are highly fragmented and competitive. Our primary competitors in these industries include companies that specialize in one or more services similar to those offered by us on a local or regional basis. We also compete with global, national, regional and local firms specializing in testing, environmental engineering and consulting services, remediation services and other services we provide. Some of our primary competitors include, in our Assessment, Permitting and Response segment, the environmental divisions of ERM, Ramboll, Geosyntec, Exponent, WSP and other large engineering companies and small businesses, in our Measurement and Analysis segment, the environmental divisions of SGS, TRC Companies, Eurofins, Pace Analytical and other large testing companies and small businesses, and in our Remediation and Reuse segment, the environmental divisions or remediation segments of Tetra Tech, AECOM, Xylem, Veolia, Mead & Hunt, and other large engineering companies and other small businesses. It is also possible that our clients may establish in-house capabilities to perform certain services that we currently provide. We operate in markets that are characterized by client demand that is often broad in scope but localized in delivery. We compete with companies that may be better positioned to capitalize on highly localized relationships and knowledge that are difficult for us to replicate. Our potential clients may prefer local providers, whether because of existing relationships or local legal restrictions or incentives that favor local businesses. Smaller regional companies may also have lower cost structures with fewer fixed costs. As a result, efforts to expand, whether organically or through acquisition, or support our service network may not improve our ability to penetrate new local markets or expand our footprint in existing markets. New entrants to our key markets could cause us to lose clients and otherwise harm our competitive position. Competition in our industry is based on many factors, but we believe the principal points of competition in our markets are the quality, range, pricing, technology and availability of services. Maintaining and improving our competitive position will require successful management of these factors, including continued investment by us in research and development, sales, marketing, technology, customer service and support, personnel and our professional networks. Our future growth rate depends upon our ability to compete successfully, which is impacted by a number of factors, including our ability to identify emerging technological trends in our target end markets, develop and maintain a wide range of competitive and appropriately priced services and solutions, defend our market share against competitors, including new and non-traditional competitors, expand into new markets and attract, develop and retain individuals with the requisite technical expertise and understanding of clients' needs to develop and sell new services. We may not be successful in maintaining or growing our competitive position for a number of reasons. Some of our competitors may have access to greater financial or other resources than we do, which may afford them greater power, efficiency, financial flexibility, geographical reach or capital resources for growth. In addition, some of our competitors are vertically integrated and can leverage this structure to their advantage. We may fail to identify optimal service or geographic markets, focus our attention in suboptimal service or geographic markets or fail to execute an appropriate business model in certain service or geographic markets. Our competitors may develop new services or technologies that are superior to ours, develop more efficient or effective methods of providing services or adapt more quickly, efficiently or effectively than we do to new technologies. Our competitors may be positioned to provide better service or influence client requirements, or more quickly respond to changing client requirements, and thereby establish stronger relationships with clients. Our competitors may offer their services at lower prices because, among other things, they possess the ability to provide similar services more efficiently, as part of a bundle with other services or generally at a lower cost. These pricing pressures could cause us to lower the price for any one or more of our services to at or below our costs, requiring us to sacrifice margins or incur losses. Alternatively, we may choose to forgo entering certain markets or exit others, which would limit our growth and competitive reach. Any failure by us to compete or to generally maintain and improve our competitive position could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

We have a limited operating history as a company and, as a result, the Montrose Environmental brand is not fully established, although many of the brands we use, including those acquired through our acquisition activity, have a longer and more well-established history. Our industry is highly fragmented and we believe that our future success depends in part on our ability to maintain and further strengthen our core brands, including the Montrose Environmental brand across the diverse range of environmental services that we provide. Strengthening our brand will require significant time, expense and the attention of management, and any success will depend largely on our marketing efforts and ability to provide our clients with high-quality services. If a client is not satisfied with our services, including those of our technical employees, it may be more damaging to our brand and business as compared to that of larger, more established companies. Additionally, to the extent our clients draw regulatory or media scrutiny regarding their environmental impact or other areas where we may provide services to them, we may as a consequence also draw scrutiny. We are also investing more in brand development and there can be no assurances that this investment will generate additional revenues or business. If we fail to successfully maintain and continue to grow the Montrose Environmental brand and our other brands through promotion and other efforts, incur excessive unanticipated expenses in attempting to promote and maintain our brands, or lose clients as a result, our business, financial condition and results of operations may be adversely affected.

Our efforts to minimize the likelihood and impact of adverse cybersecurity incidents and to protect data and intellectual property may not be successful and our business could be negatively affected by cyber or security threats or other disruptions. We routinely experience various cybersecurity threats to our technology infrastructure, unauthorized attempts to gain access to our company, employee and customer-sensitive information, insider threats and other attacks. Our customers, suppliers, subcontractors and partners experience similar security threats. In addition to cyber threats, we face threats to the security of our facilities and employees, which could materially disrupt our business if carried out. We could also be impacted by the improper conduct of our employees or others working on behalf of us who have access to export controlled or Controlled Unclassified Information ("CUI"), which could adversely affect our business and reputation. The threats we face vary from attacks common to most industries, such as ransomware, to more advanced and persistent threats, highly organized adversaries, including nation state actors, which target us and other defense contractors and other companies. These threats can cause disruptions to our business operations. In addition to cyber threats, our cybersecurity and processing systems, as well as those of our third-party service providers, including cloud service providers, newly acquired companies that have not yet been integrated, and those of our clients which we periodically manage, may experience damage or disruption from a number of causes, including power outages, computer and telecommunication failures, internal design, manual or usage errors, workplace violence or wrongdoing, catastrophic events, natural disasters, and severe weather conditions. These systems may also be damaged, disrupted, or fail entirely as a result of computer viruses or other malicious codes, social-engineering schemes, unauthorized access attempts, and cyber-attacks that could include phishing-attacks, denial-of-service attacks, ransomware, malware, and hacking. If we are unable to protect sensitive information, including complying with evolving information security and data protection/privacy regulations, our customers or governmental authorities could question the adequacy of our threat mitigation and detection processes and procedures. Moreover, depending on the severity of an incident, our customers' data, our employees' data, our intellectual property (including trade secrets and research, development and engineering know-how), and other third-party data (such as subcontractors, suppliers and vendors) could be compromised. As previously disclosed, on June 11, 2022, we were the target of an organized ransomware attack on our IT systems that, although not ultimately material to our results of operations for the year ended December 31, 2022, and December 31, 2023, or any individual fiscal quarter within those years, the attack led to the temporary disruption of our regular operations and lost revenues in 2022. See Item 7. "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations- Key Factors that Affect Our Business and Our Results-Cybersecurity." We believe our possession of CUI, confidential or protected client information may put us at a greater risk of being targeted. In addition, we manage and operate supervisory control and data acquisition systems at a number of operations and maintenance, or O&M, client facilities, including water and biogas facilities, and another cyber-attack or other system failure could cause the facility to be shutdown, which could create regulatory compliance issues, cause a contamination event or have other adverse consequences for which we could have liability. Because of the persistence, sophistication and volume of cyber-attacks, we may not be successful in defending against an attack that could have a material adverse effect on us and due to the evolving nature of these security threats, the impact of any future incident cannot be predicted. We also typically work cooperatively with our customers, suppliers, subcontractors, and entities we acquire, who or which are subject to similar threats, to seek to minimize the impact of cyber threats, other security threats or business disruptions. These entities, which are typically outside our control and may have access to our information, have varying levels of cybersecurity expertise and safeguards, and their relationships with government contractors, including us, may increase the likelihood that they are targeted by the same cyber threats we face. The security measures and procedures we, our clients, and third-party service providers have in place to protect sensitive data and other information may not be successful or sufficient to counter data breaches, cyber-attacks, or system failures. Our systems and those of third parties with whom we do business have been, and will likely continue to be, subject to these types of malicious attacks. To our knowledge, other than as noted above, there has not been a significant breach of our systems, and no attack on our systems has had a direct, material impact on us or our business to date. We cannot, however, predict the extent and severity of any additional future attacks that may occur.

We compete in various end markets and geographic regions domestically and around the world. We provide environmental services to clients operating in a number of sectors and industries, including the financial, oil & gas, utilities, construction, automotive, real-estate, midstream energy, manufacturing, commodities, petrochemical, food and beverage, telecommunications and engineering industries, as well as local, state, provincial and federal government entities. These sectors and industries and the resulting demand for our services have been, and we expect will continue to be, cyclical and subject to significant fluctuations due to a variety of factors beyond our control, including economic conditions, such as inflation and supply chain difficulties, regulatory requirements, appropriation levels and changes in client capital spending, particularly during periods of economic or political uncertainty. Important factors for our business and the businesses of our clients include macroeconomic conditions, the overall strength of, and our clients' confidence in, the economy, industrial and governmental capital spending, governmental fiscal and trading policies, environmental and regulatory policies the strength of the residential and commercial real estate markets, unemployment rates, consumer spending, availability of financing, interest rates, tax rates and changes in tax laws, political conditions, energy and commodity prices and programs such as renewable fuel standard programs and low-carbon fuel standard programs. While we attempt to minimize our exposure to economic or market fluctuations by serving a balanced mix of end markets and geographic regions, any of the above factors, individually or in the aggregate, or a significant or sustained downturn in a specific end market or geographic region, can impact our business and that of our clients. These factors may make it difficult for our clients and us to accurately forecast and plan future business activities; neither we nor our clients can predict the timing, strength or duration of any economic downturn or subsequent recovery. Furthermore, if a significant portion of our clients or projects are concentrated in a specific geographic area or industry, our business may be disproportionately affected by negative trends or economic downturns in those specific geographic areas or industries. These factors may also cause our clients to reduce their capital expenditures, alter the mix of services purchased, seek more favorable prices and other contract terms and otherwise slow their spending on our services. In addition, due to these conditions, many of our competitors may be more inclined to take greater or unusual risks or accept terms and conditions in contracts that we might not deem acceptable. These conditions and factors may reduce the demand for our services and solutions, and more generally may adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations.

We have activities outside of the United States. Our operations, as well as those of our clients, are therefore subject to regulatory, economic, political and other events and uncertainties in countries where these operations are located. Further, our growth strategy includes expansion into additional international markets, including our expansion into Europe. In addition to the risks discussed elsewhere herein that are common to both our domestic and international operations, we face risks specific to our foreign activities, including but not limited to: - political, social, economic and financial instability, including wars, civil unrest, acts of terrorism and other conflicts, including the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and surrounding areas;- difficulties and increased costs in developing, staffing and simultaneously managing a large number of varying foreign operations as a result of distance, language and cultural differences;- restrictions and limitations on the transfer or repatriation of funds and fluctuations in currency exchange rates;- complying with varying legal and regulatory environments in multiple foreign jurisdictions, including privacy laws such as the E.U. General Data Protection Regulation;- laws and business practices that favor local competitors or prohibit foreign ownership of certain businesses;- potential for privatization and other confiscatory actions; and - other dynamics in international jurisdictions, any of which could result in substantial additional legal or compliance costs, liabilities or obligations for us or could require us to significantly modify our current business practices or even exit a given market. Foreign operations bring increased complexity and the costs of managing or overseeing foreign operations, including adapting and localizing services or systems to specific regions and countries, can be material. Further, international operations carry inherent uncertainties regarding the effect of local or domestic actions, such as the United Kingdom's departure from the European Union (Brexit), any of which could be material. These and other risks related to our foreign operations, or the associated costs or liabilities, could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.