We operate our business under the two segments – Enterprise Solutions and Industrial Solutions. Effective January 1, 2020, we transferred our West Penn Wire business and multi-conductor product lines from the Enterprise Solutions segment to the Industrial Solutions segment as a result of a shift in responsibilities among the segments. We have recast the prior period segment information to conform to the change in the composition of reportable segments. A synopsis of the segments is included below:

We make forward-looking statements in this Annual Report on Form 10-K, in other materials we file with the SEC or otherwise release to the public, and on our website. In addition, our senior management might make forward-looking statements orally to investors, analysts, the media, and others. Statements concerning our future operations, prospects, strategies, financial condition, future economic performance (including growth and earnings) and demand for our products and services, and other statements of our plans, beliefs, or expectations, including the statements contained in Item 7, “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” that are not historical facts, are forward-looking statements. In some cases these statements are identifiable through the use of words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “forecast,” “guide,” “expect,” “intend,” “plan,” “project,” “target,” “can,” “could,” “may,” “should,” “will,” “would,” and similar expressions. The forward-looking statements we make are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to various assumptions, risks, and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those suggested by these forward-looking statements. These factors include, among others, those set forth in the following section and in the other documents that we file with the SEC.

In order to meet the goals in our strategic plan, we must execute our Market Delivery System ("MDS") and grow our business, both organically and through acquisitions. Our goal is to generate total revenue growth of 5-7% per year in constant currency. We may be unable to achieve this desired growthour goals due to a failure to identify growth opportunities, such as trends and technological changes in our end markets. We may ineffectively execute our Market Delivery System (“MDS”), which is designed to identify and capture growth opportunities. The broadcast, enterprise and industrial end markets we serve may not experience the growth we expect. Further, those markets may be unable to sustain growth on a long-term basis, particularly in emerging markets. If we are unable to achieve our goals related to growth, it could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations, financial position, and cash flows.

Our strategic plan is designed to continually enhance shareholder value by improving revenues and profitability, reducing costs, and improving working capital management. To achieve these goals, our strategic priorities are reliant on our Belden Business System, which includes continuing deployment of our MDS to capture market share through end-user engagement, channel management, outbound marketing, and careful vertical market selection; improving our recruitment and development of talented associates; developing strong global business platforms; acquiring businesses that fit our strategic plan; and becomingcontinuing to be a leading Lean company. We have a disciplined process for deploying this strategic plan through our associates. There is a risk that we may not be successful in developing or executing these measures to achieve the expected results for a variety of reasons, including market developments, economic conditions, shortcomings in establishing appropriate action plans, or challenges with executing multiple initiatives simultaneously. For example, our MDS initiative may not succeed or we may lose market share due to challenges in choosing the right products to market or the right customers for these products, integrating products of acquired companies into our sales and marketing strategy, or strategically bidding against OEM partners. We may fail to identify growth opportunities. We may not be able to acquire businesses that fit our strategic plan on acceptable business terms, and we may not achieve our other strategic priorities.

Emerging markets are a significant focus of our strategic plan. The developing nature of these markets presents a number of risks. We may be unable to attract, develop, and retain appropriate talent to manage our businesses in emerging markets. Deterioration of social, political, labor, or economic conditions in a specific country or region may adversely affect our operations or financial results. Emerging markets may not meet our growth expectations, and we may be unable to maintain such growth or to balance such growth with financial goals and compliance requirements. Among the risks in emerging market countries are bureaucratic intrusions and delays, contract compliance failures, engrained business partners that do not comply with local or U.S. law, such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, fluctuating currencies and interest rates, limitations on the amount and nature of investments, restrictions on permissible forms and structures of investment, unreliable legal and financial infrastructure, regime disruption and political unrest, uncontrolled inflation and commodity prices, fierce local competition by companies with better political connections, and corruption. In addition, the costs of compliance with local laws and regulations in emerging markets may negatively impact our competitive position as compared to locally owned manufacturers.

In order to meet the goals in our strategic plan, we must complete further acquisitions.acquisitions and divestitures. The extent to which appropriate acquisitions are made will affect our overall growth, operating results, financial condition, and cash flows. Our ability to acquire businesses successfully will decline if we are unable to identify appropriate acquisition targets consistent with our strategic plan, the competition among potential buyers increases, the cost of acquiring suitable businesses becomes too expensive, or we lack sufficient sources of capital. As a result, we may be unable to make acquisitions or be forced to pay more or agree to less advantageous acquisition terms for the companies that we are ablewould like to acquire.

We may have difficulty integrating acquired businesses and future acquisitions might not meet our performance expectations. Some of the integration challenges we might face include differences in corporate culture and management styles, additional or conflicting governmental regulations, compliance with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, financial reporting that is not in compliance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, disparate company policies and practices, customer relationship issues, and retention of key personnel. In addition, management may be required to devote a considerable amount of time to the integration process, which could decrease the amount of time we have to manage the other businesses. We may not be able to integrate

In addition to manufacturing and other operating facilities in the U.S., we have manufacturing and other operating facilities in Brazil, Canada, China, India, Japan, Mexico, St. Kitts, and several European countries. We rely on suppliers in many countries, including China. Our foreign operations are subject to economic, social, and political risks inherent in maintaining operations abroad such as economic and political destabilization, land use risks, international conflicts, pandemics and other health-related crises, restrictive actions by foreign governments, and adverse foreign tax laws. In addition to economic and political risk, a risk associated with our European manufacturing operations is the higher relative expense and length of time required to adjust manufacturing employment capacity. We also face political risks in the U.S., including tax or regulatory risks or potential adverse impacts from legislative impasses over, or significant legislative, regulatory or executive changes in fiscal or monetary policy and other foreign and domestic government policies, including, but not limited to, trade policies and import/export policies.

Approximately 49%45% of our sales are outside the U.S. Other than the U.S. dollar, the principal currencies to which we are exposed through our manufacturing operations, sales, and related cash holdings are the euro, the Canadian dollar, the Hong Kong dollar, the Chinese yuan, the Japanese yen, the Mexican peso, the Australian dollar, the British pound, and the Brazilian real. Generally, we have revenues and costs in the same currency, thereby reducing our overall currency risk, although any realignment of our manufacturing capacity among our global facilities could alter this balance. When the U.S. dollar strengthens against other currencies, the results of our non-U.S. operations are translated at a lower exchange rate and thus into lower reported revenues and earnings.

Like most multinational companies, we have supply chains and sales channels that extend beyond national borders. Purchasing and production decisions in some cases are largely influenced by the trade agreements and the tax and tariff structures in place. Disruption in those structures can create significant market uncertainty. While the impact of Brexit and the announced U.S. and Chinese tariff actions are not expected to becurrently material to us, unanticipated complications in the free movement of goods in Europe, an escalation of tariff activity anywhere in the world or changes to existing free trade agreements could materially impact our financial results. In addition to the potential direct impacts of free trade restrictions, longer term macroeconomic consequences could result, including slower growth, inflation, higher interest rates and unfavorable impacts to currency exchange rates. Any of these factors could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.

Uncertainty in U.S. and global financial and equity markets could make it more expensive for us to conduct our operations and more difficult for our customers to buy our products. Additionally, market volatility or uncertainty may cause us to be unable to pursue or complete acquisitions. Our ability to implement our business strategy and grow our business, particularly through acquisitions, may depend on our ability to raise capital by selling equity or debt securities or obtaining additional debt financing. Market conditions may prevent us from obtaining financing when we need it or on terms acceptable to us.

Our customers use our signal transmission solutions in a wide variety of IT systems and application environments in order to help reduce security vulnerabilities and demonstrate compliance. Despite our efforts to make clear in our marketing materials and customer agreements the capabilities and limitations of these products, some customers may incorrectly view the deployment of such products in their IT infrastructure as a guarantee that there will be no security breachincident or policy non-compliance event. As a result, the occurrence of a high profile security breach,incident, or a failure by one of our customers to pass a regulatory compliance IT audit, could result in public and customer perception that our solutions are not effective and harm our business and operating results, even if the occurrence is unrelated to the use of such products or if the failure is the result of actions or inactions on the part of the customer.

Consolidation of our distributors particularly where the survivor relies more heavily on our competitors, could adversely impact our revenues and earnings. It could also result in consolidation of distributor inventory, which would temporarily depress our revenues. We have also experienced financial failure of distributors from time to time, resulting in our inability to collect accounts receivable in full. A global economic downturn could cause financial difficulties (including bankruptcy) for our distributors and other customers, which would adversely affect our results of operations.

The loss of any of our senior management or other key employees, for example sales and product development employees could have an adverse effect on us. We may not be able to find qualified replacements for these individuals and the integration of potential replacements may be disruptive to our business. More broadly, a key determinant of our success is our ability to attract, develop, and retain talented associates. While this is one of our strategic priorities, we may not be able to succeed in this regard.

Disagreements about patents and other intellectual property rights occur in the markets we serve. Third parties have asserted and may in the future assert claims of infringement of intellectual property rights against us or against our customers or channel partners for which we may be liable. Furthermore, a successful claimant could secure a judgment that requires us to pay substantial damages or prevents us from distributing certain products or performing certain services. We may encounter difficulty enforcing our own intellectual property rights against third parties, which could result in price erosion or loss of market share.

We are subject to laws and regulations affecting our domestic and international operations in a number of areas. These U.S. and foreign laws and regulations affect our activities including, but not limited to, in areas of labor, advertising, real estate, billing, e-commerce, promotions, quality of services, property ownership and infringement, tax, import and export requirements, anti-corruption, foreign exchange controls and cash repatriation restrictions, data privacy requirements, anti-competition, environmental, health and safety.

Compliance with these laws, regulations and similar requirements may be onerous and expensive, and they may be inconsistent from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, further increasing the cost of compliance and doing business. Any such costs, which may rise in the future as a result of changes in these laws and regulations or in their interpretation, could individually or in the aggregate make our products and services less attractive to our customers, delay the introduction of new products in one or more regions, or cause us to change or limit our business practices. We have implemented policies and procedures designed to ensure compliance with applicable laws and regulations, but there can be no assurance that our employees, contractors, or agents will not violate such laws and regulations or our policies and procedures.

Specifically with respect to data privacy, new data protection regulations have been adopted or are being considered for most of the developed world. Most notable are the European Commission has approved a data protection regulation, known asCommission’s adoption of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which became effective in May 2018.2018 and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), which became law on January 1, 2020. The GDPR includesand CCPA include operational requirements for companies that receive or process personal data of residents of the European Union that are different than those previously in place in the European Union,their respective jurisdictions and includesinclude significant penalties for non-compliance. In addition, some countries are considering or have passed legislation implementing data protection requirements or requiring local storage and processing of data or similar requirements that could increase the cost and complexity of delivering our services.

Under accounting principles generally accepted in the U.S., goodwill and certain other intangible assets are not amortized but must be reviewed for possible impairment annually or more often in certain circumstances if events indicate that the asset values may not be recoverable. We have incurred significant charges for the impairment of goodwill and other intangible assets in the past, and we may be required to do so again in future periods if the underlying value of our business declines. Such a charge would reduce our income without any change to our underlying cash flows.

Some of our employees, primarily outside the U.S., are members of collective bargaining groups. We believe that our relations with employees are generally good. However, if there were a dispute with one of these bargaining groups, the affected operations could be interrupted, resulting in lost revenues, lost profit contribution, and customer dissatisfaction.

We are also a party to various legal proceedings and administrative actions that are incidental to our operations. In our opinion, the proceedings and actions in which we are involved should not, individually or in the aggregate, have a material adverse effect on our financial condition, operating results, or cash flows. However, since the trends and outcome of this litigation are inherently uncertain, we cannot give absolute assurance regarding the future resolution of such litigation, or that such litigation may not become material in the future.