Disclosure Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This Annual Report on Form 10-K contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the “Exchange Act”) relating to our operations, results of operations and other matters that are based on our current expectations, estimates, assumptions and projections. Words such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “likely,” “anticipates,” “expects,” “intends,” “plans,” “projects,” “believes,” “estimates,” “positioned,” “outlook” and similar expressions are used to identify these forward-looking statements. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Forward-looking statements are based upon assumptions as to future events that may not prove to be accurate. Actual outcomes and results may differ materially from what is expressed or forecast in these forward-looking statements. Risks, uncertainties and other factors that might cause such differences, some of which could be material, include, but are not limited to, the factors discussed below under the section entitled “Risk Factors.” Our forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this report or as of the date they are made, and we undertake no obligation to update them.

Available Information

Our website address is www.accenture.com. We use our website as a channel of distribution for company information. We make available free of charge on the Investor Relations section of our website (http://investor.accenture.com) our Annual Report on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and all amendments to those reports as soon as reasonably practicable after such material is electronically filed with or furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Exchange Act. We also make available through our website other reports filed with or furnished to the SEC under the Exchange Act, including our proxy statements and reports filed by officers and directors under Section 16(a) of the Exchange Act, as well as our Code of Business Ethics. Financial and other material information regarding us is routinely posted on and accessible at http://investor.accenture.com. We do not intend for information contained in our website to be part of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Any materials we file with the SEC may be read and copied at the SEC’s Public Reference Room at 100 F Street, NE, Washington, DC, 20549. Information on the operation of the Public Reference Room may be obtained by calling the SEC at 1-800-SEC-0330. The SEC maintains an Internet site (http://www.sec.gov) that contains reports, proxy and information statements and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the SEC.

In this Annual Report on Form 10-K, we use the terms “Accenture,” “we,” the “Company,” “our” and “us” to refer to Accenture plc and its subsidiaries or, prior to September 1, 2009, to Accenture Ltd and its subsidiaries. All references to years, unless otherwise noted, refer to our fiscal year, which ends on August 31.

ITEM 1.    BUSINESS

Overview

We operate globally with one common brand and business model, designed to enableallowing us to provide clients around the world with the same high level of service. Drawing on a combination of industry and functional expertise, functionaltechnology capabilities and alliances, and our global delivery resources, and technology, we seek to deliver competitively priced, high-valueprovide differentiated services that help our clients measurably improve their business performance.performance and create sustainable value for their customers and stakeholders. Our global delivery model enables us to provide an end-to-end delivery capability by drawing on our global resources to deliver high-quality, cost-effective solutions to our clients.

In fiscal 2013,2016, we continued to implement a strategy focused on industry and technology differentiation, as well as geographic expansion.leveraging our global organization to serve clients in locally relevant ways. We combine our capabilities across management consulting, technology and business process outsourcingcontinued to provide differentiated, industry- and function-based, end-to-end business services. We continue to invest make significant investments—in strategic initiatives including analytics, cloud computing, insight-driven health, interactive/digital marketing, mobility and smart grid. In fiscal 2013, these investments included a number of acquisitions, in interactive/digital marketing. Our geographic expansion strategy focuses on emergingassets and mature markets with significant growth potential for us. Our priority emerging markets are theofferings, in branding and thought leadership, and in attracting and developing talent—to further enhance our differentiation and competitiveness.

A key differentiator is our global delivery model, which allows us to draw on the benefits of using people and other resources from around the world—including scalable, standardized processes, methods and tools; automation and artificial intelligence; industry expertise and specialized management consulting, business process and technology skills;capabilities; cost advantages; foreign language fluency; proximity to clients; and time zone advantages—to deliver high-quality solutions. Emphasizing quality, productivity, reduced risk, speed to market and predictability, our global delivery model enables ussupports all parts of our business to provide clients with price-competitive services and solutions.

We have sales and delivery alliances with companies whose capabilities complement our own by, among other things, enhancing a service offering, delivering a new technology or helping us extend our services to new geographies. By combining our alliance partners’ products and services with our own capabilities and expertise, we create innovative, high-value business solutions for our clients. Most of our alliances are non-exclusive. These alliances can generate significant revenues from services we provide to implement our alliance partners’ products as well as revenue from the resale of their products. We also receive as reimbursement some direct payments, which are not material to our business, from our alliance partners to cover costs we incur for marketing and other assistance.

Our research and innovation program is designed to generate early insights into how knowledge can be harnessed to create innovative business solutions for our clients and to develop business strategies with significant value. One component of this is ourOur innovation capabilities include research and thought leadership to identify market and technology trends. We also partner with and invest in growth-stage companies that create innovative enterprise technologies. Our Accenture Labs incubate and prototype new concepts through applied research and development organization, Accenture Technology Labs, which identifiesprojects. In addition, our studios, innovation centers and develops new technologies that we believe will bedelivery centers build, scale and industrialize the driversdelivery of our clients’ growth and enable them to be first to market with unique capabilities.innovations.

As a significant portiontalent-led organization, one of our research and development investment directly through our operating groups and our consulting, technology and outsourcing growth platformskey goals is to develop market-ready solutions for our clients.

As of August 31, 2013,2016, we employed approximately 384,000 people and had approximately 275,000 employees worldwide.offices and operations in more than 200 cities in 55 countries.

We provide value to our clients based in part on a differentiated range of proprietary inventions, methodologies, software, reusable knowledge capital and other intellectual property. We recognize the increasing value of intellectual property in the marketplace and create, harvest, and protect this intellectual property. We leverage patent, trade secret, copyright and trademark laws as well as contractual arrangements to protect our intellectual property. We have also established policies to respect the intellectual property rights of third parties, such as our clients, partners and others.

As of August 31, 2013,2016, we had 2,632over 2,475 patent applications pending in the United States and other jurisdictionsworldwide and had been issued 855over 1,250 U.S. patents and 1,0001,750 non-U.S. patents.

Organizational Structure

Accenture plc is an Irish public limited company with no material assets other than Class I commonordinary and deferred shares in its subsidiary, Accenture SCA, a Luxembourg partnershipHoldings plc, an Irish public limited by shares (“Accenture SCA”). Accenture plc’s only business is to hold these

Prior to our transition to a corporate structure in fiscal 2001, we operated as a series of related partnerships and corporations under the control of our partners. In connection with our transition to a corporate structure, our partners generally exchanged all of their interests in these partnerships and corporations for Accenture Ltd Class A common shares or, in the case of partners in certain countries, Accenture SCA Class I common shares of Accenture SCA, a Luxembourg partnership limited by shares and direct subsidiary of Accenture Ltd (“Accenture SCA”), or exchangeable shares issued by Accenture Canada Holdings Inc., an indirect subsidiary of Accenture SCA. Generally, partners who received Accenture SCA Class I common shares or Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares also received a corresponding number of Accenture Ltd Class X common shares, which entitled their holders to vote at Accenture Ltd shareholder meetings but did not carry any economic rights. The combination of the Accenture Ltd Class X common shares and the Accenture SCA Class I common shares or Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares gave these partners substantially similar economic and governance rights as holders of Accenture Ltd Class A common shares.

On June 10, 2009, Accenture plc was incorporated in Ireland, as a public limited company, in order to effect moving the place of incorporation of our parent holding company from Bermuda to Ireland (the “Transaction”). The TransactionIreland. This transaction was completed on September 1, 2009, at which time Accenture Ltd, our predecessor holding company, became a wholly owned subsidiary of Accenture plc and Accenture plc became our parent holding company. Accenture Ltd was dissolved on December 29, 2009.

On December 1, 2012, we ceased usingApril 10, 2015, Accenture Holdings plc was incorporated in Ireland, as a public limited company, in order to further consolidate Accenture’s presence in Ireland. On August 26, 2015, Accenture SCA merged with and into Accenture Holdings plc, with Accenture Holdings plc as the designation “senior executive.”surviving entity. This merger was a transaction between entities under common control and had no effect on the Company’s Consolidated Financial Statements.

All references to Accenture Holdings plc included in this report with respect to periods prior to August 26, 2015 reflect the activity and/or balances of Accenture SCA (the predecessor of Accenture Holdings plc). The majority of our leaders are now designated “managing directors,”Consolidated Financial Statements reflect the ownership interests in Accenture Holdings plc and a select group of our most experienced leaders are “senior managing directors.” Managing directorsAccenture Canada Holdings Inc. held by certain current and senior managing directors, along withformer members of the Accenture Leadership as noncontrolling interests. “Accenture Leadership” is comprised of members of our global management committee (the Company’s primary management and leadership team, which consists of 17approximately 20 of our most senior leaders), comprise “Accenture Leadership.”

Each Class A ordinary share and each Class X ordinary share of Accenture plc entitles its holder to one vote on all matters submitted to a vote of shareholders of Accenture plc. A Class X ordinary share does not, however, entitle its holder to receive dividends or to receive payments upon a liquidation of Accenture plc. As described above under “—History,” Class X ordinary shares generally provide the holders of Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares and Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares with a vote at Accenture plc shareholder meetings that is equivalent to the voting rights held by Accenture plc Class A ordinary shareholders, while their economic rights consist of interests in Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares or in Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares.

Under its memorandum and articles of association, Accenture plc may redeem, at its option, any Class X ordinary share for a redemption price equal to the nominal value of the Class X ordinary share, or $0.0000225 per share. Accenture plc, as successor to Accenture Ltd, has separately agreed with the original holders of Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares and Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares not to redeem any Class X ordinary share of such holder if the redemption would reduce the number of Class X ordinary shares held by that holder to a number that is less than the number of Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares or Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares owned by that holder. Accenture plc will redeem Class X ordinary shares upon the redemption or exchange of Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares and Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares so that the aggregate number of Class X ordinary shares outstanding at any time does not exceed the aggregate number

A transfer of Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares effected by transfer of a book-entry interest in The Depository Trust Company will not be subject to Irish stamp duty. Other transfers of Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares may be subject to Irish stamp duty (currently at the rate of 1% of the price paid or the market value of the Class A ordinary shares acquired, if higher) payable by the buyer.

Only Accenture SCAplc beneficially holds Accenture Holdings plc deferred shares. The deferred shares were issued solely to ensure that Accenture Holdings plc satisfies Irish law minimum share capital requirements for public limited companies at all times and carry no voting rights or income rights and have only limited rights on a return of capital equal to the nominal value of those shares.

Except in the case of a redemption of Class I commonAccenture Holdings plc ordinary shares or a transfer of Class I commonAccenture Holdings plc ordinary shares to Accenture plc or one of its subsidiaries, Accenture SCA’sHoldings plc’s articles of association provide that Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares may be transferred only with the consent of the general partnerBoard of Directors of Accenture SCA.Holdings plc. In addition, all holders of Class I commonordinary shares (except Accenture)Accenture plc) are precluded from having their shares redeemed by Accenture SCAHoldings plc or transferred to Accenture SCA,Holdings plc, Accenture plc or a subsidiary of Accenture plc at any time or during any period when Accenture SCAHoldings plc determines, based on the advice of counsel, that there is material non-public information that may affect the average price per share of Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares, if the redemption would be prohibited by applicable law during an underwritten offering due to an underwriters lock-upor regulation, or during the period from the announcement of a tender offer by Accenture SCAHoldings plc or its affiliates for Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares, or any securities convertible into, or exchangeable or exercisable for, ordinary shares, until the expiration of ten business days after the termination of the tender offer (other than to tender the holder’s Accenture SCA Class I commonHoldings plc ordinary shares in the tender offer).

Holders of Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares may exchange their shares for Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares at any time on a one-for-one basis. Accenture may, at its option, satisfy this exchange with cash at a price per share generally equal to the market price of an Accenture plc Class A ordinary share at the time of the exchange. Each exchangeable share of Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. entitles its holder to receive distributions equal to any distributions to which an Accenture plc Class A ordinary share entitles its holder. The exchange of all of the outstanding Accenture Canada Holdings Inc. exchangeable shares for Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares would not have a material impact on the equity ownership position of Accenture or the other shareholders of Accenture SCA.Holdings plc.

ITEM 1A.    RISK FACTORS

In addition to the other information set forth in this report, you should carefully consider the following factors which could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations (including revenues and profitability) and/or stock price. Our business is also subject to general risks and uncertainties that may broadly affect companies, including us. Additional risks and uncertainties not currently known to us or that we currently deem to be immaterial also could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and/or stock price.

Our results of operations could be adversely affected by volatile, negative or uncertain economic conditions and the effects of these conditions on our clients’ businesses and levels of business activity.

Global macroeconomic conditions affect our clients’ businesses and the markets they serve. Volatile, negative or uncertain economic conditions in our significant markets have undermined and could in the future undermine business confidence in our significant markets or in other markets, which are increasingly interdependent, and cause our clients to reduce or defer their spending on new initiatives and technologies, or may result in clients reducing, delaying or eliminating spending under existing contracts with us, which would negatively affect our business. Growth in the markets we serve could be at a slow rate, or could stagnate or contract, in each case, for an extended period of time. Differing economic conditions and patterns of economic growth and contraction in the geographical regions in which we operate and the industries we serve have affected and may in the future affect demand for our services. For example, revenue growth in local currency during fiscal 2013 was lower than we expected due, in large part, to lower than expected demand, particularly in certain geographies experiencing challenging macroeconomic conditions, such as certain countries in Europeservices and in Brazil.solutions. A material portion of our revenues and profitability is derived from our clients in EuropeNorth America and North America.Europe. Weak demand or a slower than expected recovery in these markets could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations. In addition, because we operate globally and have significant businesses in markets outside of North America and Europe, an economic slowdown in key emergingone or more of those other markets where we typically grow faster than in more mature markets, also

Economic volatility and uncertainty is particularly challenging because it may take some time for the effects and changes in demand patterns resulting from these and other factors to manifest themselves in our business and results of operations. Changing demand patterns from economic volatility and uncertainty could have a significant negative impact on our results of operations.

We operate in a rapidly evolving environment in which there currently are, and we expect will continue to be, new technology entrants. New services or technologies offered by competitors or new entrants may make our offerings less differentiated or less competitive when compared to other alternatives, which may adversely affect our results of operations. In addition, companies in the industries we serve sometimes seek to achieve economies of scale and other synergies by combining with or acquiring other companies. If one of our current clients merges or consolidates with a company that relies on another provider for its consulting, systems integrationthe services and technology, or outsourcing services,solutions we offer, we may lose work from that client or lose the opportunity to gain additional work if we are not successful in generating new opportunities from the merger or consolidation. At any given time in a particular industry or geography, one or a small number of clients could contribute a significant portion of our revenues, and any decision by such a client to delay, reduce, or eliminate spending on our services and solutions could have a disproportionate impact on the results of operations in the relevant industry and/or geography.

Many of our consulting contracts are less than 12 months in duration, and these contracts typically permit a client to terminate the agreement with as little as 30 days’ notice. Longer-term, larger and more complex contracts, such as the majority of our outsourcing contracts, generally require a longer notice period for termination and often include an early termination charge to be paid to us, but this charge might not be sufficient to cover our costs or make up for anticipated ongoing revenues and profits lost upon termination of the contract. Many of our contracts allow clients to terminate, or delay, reduce or eliminate spending on the services and solutions we provide. Additionally, a client could choose not to retain us for additional stages of a project, try to renegotiate the terms of its contract or cancel or delay additional planned work. When contracts are terminated or not renewed, we lose the anticipated revenues, and it may take significant time to replace the level of revenues lost. Consequently, our results of operations in subsequent periods could be materially lower than expected. The specific business or financial condition of a client, changes in management and changes in a client’s strategy are also are all factors that can result in terminations, cancellations or delays.

We are particularly dependent on retaining members of Accenture Leadership and other experienced managers, and if we are unable to do so, our ability to develop new business and effectively leadmanage our current projectscontracts and client relationships could be jeopardized. We depend on identifying, developing and retaining key employees to provide leadership and direction for our businesses. This includes developing talent and leadership capabilities in emerging markets, where the depth of skilled employees is often limited and competition for these resources is intense. Our geographic expansion strategyability to expand geographically depends, in emerging markets dependslarge part, on our ability to attract, retain and integrate both leaders for the local business leaders and people with the appropriate skills.

Similarly, our profitability depends on our ability to effectively utilize personnel with the right mix of skills and experience to perform services for our clients, including our ability to transition employees to new assignments on a timely basis. If we are unable to effectively deploy our employees globally on a timely basis to fulfill the needs of our clients, our ability to perform our

Our equity-based incentive compensation plans are designed to reward high-performing personnel for their contributions and provide incentives for them to remain with us. If the anticipated value of such incentives does not materialize because of volatility or lack of positive performance in our stock price, or if our total compensation package is not viewed as being competitive, our ability to attract and retain the personnel we need could be adversely affected. In addition, if we do not obtain the shareholder approval needed to continue granting equity awards under our share plans in the amounts we believe are necessary, our ability to attract and retain personnel could be negatively affected.

There is a risk that at certain points in time, and in certain geographical regions, we will find it difficult to hire and retain a sufficient number of employees with the skills or backgrounds to meet current and/or future demand. In these cases, we might need to redeploy existing personnel or increase our reliance on subcontractors to fill certain labor needs, and if not done effectively, our profitability could be negatively impacted. Additionally, if demand for our services and solutions were to escalate at a high rate, we may need to adjust our compensation practices, which could put upward pressure on our costs and adversely affect our profitability if we are unable to recover these increased costs. At certain times, however, we may also have more personnel than we need in certain skill sets or geographies.geographies or at compensation levels that are not aligned with skill sets. In these situations, we must evaluate voluntary attritionhave engaged, and usemay in the future engage, in actions to rebalance our resources, including through reduced levels of new hiring and increased involuntary terminations as a means to keep our supply of skills and resources in balance with client demanddemand. If we are not successful in those geographies.these initiatives, our results of operations could be adversely affected.

The markets in which we offer our services and solutions are highly competitive. Our competitors include:

Some competitors are companies that may have greater financial, marketing or other resources than we do and, therefore, may be better able to compete for new work and skilled professionals.professionals, may be able to innovate and provide new services and solutions faster than we can or may be able to anticipate the need for services and solutions before we do.

Even if we have potential offerings that address marketplace or client needs, competitors may be more successful at selling similar services they offer, including to companies that are our clients. Some competitors are more established in certain emerging markets, and that may make executing our geographic expansion strategy in these markets more challenging. Additionally, competitors may also offer more aggressive contractual terms, which may affect our ability to win work. Our future performance is largely dependent on our ability to compete successfully in the markets we currently serve, while expanding into additional markets. If we are unable to compete successfully, we could lose market share and clients to competitors, which could materially adversely affect our results of operations.

In addition, we may face greater competition due to consolidation of companies in the technology sector through strategic mergers or acquisitions. Consolidation activity may result in new competitors with greater scale, a broader footprint or offerings that are more attractive than ours. For example, there has been a trend toward consolidation among hardware manufacturers, software developers and vendors, and service providers, which has resulted in the convergence of products and services. Over time, our access to suchcertain technology products and services may be reduced as a result of this consolidation. Additionally, vertically integrated companies are able to offer as a single provider more integrated services (software and hardware) to clients than we can in some cases and therefore may represent a more attractive alternative to clients. If buyers of services favor using a single provider for an integrated technology stack, such buyers may direct more business to such competitors, and this could materially adversely affect our competitive position and our results of operations.

We could have liability or our reputation could be damaged if we fail to protect client and/or Accenture data from security breaches or information systems as obligated by law or contract or if our information systems are breached.cyberattacks.

We are dependent on information technology networks and systems to securely process, transmit and store electronic information and to communicate among our locations around the world and with our clients, alliance partners and vendors. As the breadth and complexity of this infrastructure continuecontinues to grow, including as a result of the use of mobile technologies, social media and cloud-based services, the potential risk of security breaches and cyberattacks increases. Such breaches could lead to shutdowns or disruptions of our systems and potential unauthorized disclosure of sensitive or confidential information.information, including personal data.

In providing services and solutions to clients, we often manage, utilize and store sensitive or confidential client or Accenture data, including personal data. Asdata, and we expect these activities to increase, including through the use of analytics. Unauthorized disclosure of sensitive or confidential client or Accenture data, whether through systems failure, employee negligence, fraud or misappropriation, could damage our reputation, cause us to lose clients and could result in significant financial exposure. Similarly, unauthorized access to or through our information systems or those we develop for our clients, whether by our employees or third parties, including a cyberattack by computer programmers, hackers, members of organized crime and/or state-sponsored organizations, who may develop and deploy viruses or other malicious software programs or social engineering attacks, could result wein negative publicity, significant remediation costs, legal liability, damage to our reputation and government sanctions and could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations. Cybersecurity threats are constantly evolving, thereby increasing the difficulty of detecting and defending against them.

We are subject to numerous laws and regulations designed to protect this information, such as the national laws implementing the European Union Directive on Data Protection and(which will be replaced by the European Union General Data Protection Regulation from 2018 onwards), various U.S. federal and state laws governing the protection of health or other personally identifiable information.information and data privacy and cybersecurity laws in other regions. These laws and regulations are increasing in complexity and number, change frequently and sometimes conflict among the various countries in which we operate. If any person, including any of our employees, negligently disregards or intentionally breaches our established controls with respect to client or Accenture data, or otherwise mismanages or misappropriates that data, we could be subject to significant litigation, monetary damages, regulatory enforcement actions, fines and/or criminal prosecution in one or more jurisdictions. These monetary damages might not be subject to a contractual limit of liability or an exclusion of consequential or indirect damages and could be significant. Unauthorized disclosure of sensitive or confidential client or Accenture data, whether through systems failure, employee negligence, fraud or misappropriation, could damage our reputation and cause us to lose clients. Similarly, unauthorized access to or through our information systems or those we develop for our clients, whether by our employees or third parties, including a cyberattack by computer programmers and hackers who may develop and deploy viruses, worms or other malicious software programs, could result in negative publicity, significant remediation costs, legal liability, damage to our reputation and government sanctions and could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations. In addition, our liability insurance, which includes cyber insurance, might not be sufficient in type or amount to cover us against claims related to security breaches, cyberattacks and other related breaches.

Our profitability could materially suffer if we are unable to obtain favorable pricing for our services and solutions, if we are unable to remain competitive, if our cost-management strategies are unsuccessful or if we experience delivery inefficiencies.

For example, we could be subject to significant legal liability and litigation expense if we fail to meet our contractual obligations, contribute to internal control deficiencies of a client or otherwise breach obligations to third parties, including clients, alliance partners, employees and former employees, and other parties with whom we conduct business, or if our subcontractors breach or dispute the terms of our agreements with them and impede our ability to meet our obligations to our clients. We may enter into agreements with non-standard terms because we perceive an important economic opportunity or because our personnel did not adequately follow our contracting guidelines. In addition, the contracting practices of competitors, along with the demands of increasingly sophisticated clients, may cause contract terms and conditions that are unfavorable to us to become new standards in the marketplace. We may find ourselves committed to providing services or solutions that we are unable to deliver or whose delivery will reduce our profitability or cause us financial loss. If we cannot adaptor do not meet our contractual obligations and if our potential liability is not adequately limited through the terms of our agreements, liability limitations are not enforced or a third party alleges fraud or other wrongdoing to prevent us from relying upon those contractual protections, we might face significant legal liability and litigation expense and our results of operations could be materially adversely affected. In addition, as we expand our services and solutions into new areas, such as taking over the operation of certain portions of our clients’ businesses, which increasingly include the operation of functions and systems that are critical to the core businesses of our clients, we may be exposed to additional operational, regulatory or other risks specific to these new areas, including risks related to data security. A failure of a client’s system based on our services or solutions could also subject us to a claim for significant damages that could materially adversely affect our results of operations.

Our clients include national, provincial, state and local governmental entities. Our government work carries various risks inherent in the government contracting process. These risks include, but are not limited to, ongoingthe following:

The occurrences or conditions described above could affect not only our business with the particular government entities involved, but also our business with other entities of the same or other governmental bodies or with certain commercial clients, and could have a material adverse effect on our abilitybusiness or our results of operations.

We expect to continue pursuing strategic and targeted acquisitions, investments and joint ventures to developenhance or add to our skills and implementcapabilities or offerings of services and solutions, or to enable us to expand in certain geographic and other markets. Depending on the opportunities available, we may increase the amount of capital invested in such opportunities. We may not successfully identify suitable investment opportunities. We also might not succeed in completing targeted transactions or achieve desired results of operations. Furthermore, we face risks in successfully integrating any businesses we might acquire or create through a joint venture. Ongoing business may be disrupted, and our management’s attention may be diverted by acquisition, investment, transition or integration activities. In addition, we might need to dedicate additional management and other resources, and our organizational structure could make it difficult for us to efficiently integrate acquired businesses into our ongoing operations and assimilate and retain employees of those businesses into our culture and operations. Acquisitions or joint ventures may result in significant costs and expenses, including those related to retention payments, equity compensation, severance pay, early retirement costs, intangible asset amortization and asset impairment charges, assumed litigation and other liabilities, and legal, accounting and financial advisory fees, which could negatively affect our profitability. We may have difficulties as a result of entering into new markets where we have limited or no direct prior experience or where competitors may have stronger market positions.

We might fail to realize the expected benefits or strategic objectives of any acquisition, investment or joint venture we undertake. We might not achieve our expected return on investment or may lose money. We may be adversely impacted by liabilities that anticipatewe assume from a company we acquire or in which we invest, including from that company’s known and respondunknown obligations, intellectual property or other assets, terminated employees, current or former clients or other third parties. In addition, we may fail to rapid and continuing changesidentify or adequately assess the magnitude of certain liabilities, shortcomings or other circumstances prior to acquiring, investing in technology and industry developments and offerings by new entrantsor partnering with a company, including potential

We periodically evaluate, and have engaged in, the right strategic investmentsdisposition of assets and businesses. Divestitures could involve difficulties in the separation of operations, services, products and personnel, the diversion of management’s attention, the disruption of our business and the potential loss of key employees. After reaching an agreement with a buyer for the disposition of a business, the transaction may be subject to respondthe satisfaction of pre-closing conditions as well as to obtaining necessary regulatory and government approvals, which, if not satisfied or obtained, may prevent us from completing the transaction. Divestitures may also involve continued financial involvement in the divested assets and businesses, such as indemnities or other financial obligations, in which the performance of the divested assets or businesses could impact our results of operations. Any divestiture we undertake could adversely affect our results of operations.

Our business model is dependent on our Global Delivery Network, which includes Accenture personnel based at more than 50 delivery centers around the world. While these developmentsdelivery centers are located throughout the world, we have based large portions of our delivery network in India, where we have the largest number of people in our delivery network located, and successfully drive innovation,the Philippines, where we have the second largest number of people located. Concentrating our servicesGlobal Delivery Network in these locations presents a number of operational risks, many of which are beyond our control. For example, natural disasters of the type described below, some of which India and solutions,the Philippines have experienced and other countries may experience, could impair the ability of our people to safely travel to and work in our facilities and disrupt our ability to perform work through our delivery centers. Additionally, both India and the Philippines have experienced, and other countries may experience, political instability, worker strikes, civil unrest and hostilities with neighboring countries. Military activity or civil hostilities in the future, as well as terrorist activities and other conditions, which are described more fully below, could significantly disrupt our ability to perform work through our delivery centers. Our business continuity and disaster recovery plans may not be effective, particularly if catastrophic events occur. If any of these circumstances occurs, we have a greater risk that the interruptions in communications with our clients and other Accenture locations and personnel, and any down-time in important processes we operate for clients, could result in a material adverse effect on our results of operations and our ability to develop and maintain a competitive advantage and continue to grow could be negatively affected.

We have offices and operations in more than 200 cities in 5655 countries around the world. One aspect of our growth strategy is to continue to expand globally, and particularly to seek significant growth in our priority emerging markets.key markets around the world. Our growth strategy might not be successful. If we are unable to manage the risks of our global operations and geographic expansion strategy, including international hostilities, terrorist activities, natural disasters, security breaches, failure to maintain compliance with our clients’ control requirements and multiple legal and regulatory systems, our results of operations and ability to grow could be materially adversely affected. In addition, emerging markets generally involve greater financial and operational risks, such as those described below, than our more mature markets. Negative or uncertain political climates in countries or geographies where we operate could also adversely affect us.

In particular, in many parts of the world, including countries in which we operate and/or seek to expand, practices in the local business community might not conform to international business standards and could violate anticorruption laws, or regulations, including the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the UK Bribery Act 2010. Our employees, subcontractors, vendors, agents, alliance or joint venture partners, the companies we acquire and their employees, subcontractors, vendors and agents, and other third parties with which we associate, could take actions that violate policies or procedures designed to promote legal and regulatory compliance or applicable anticorruption laws or regulations. Violations of these laws or regulations by us, our employees or any of these third parties could subject us to criminal or civil enforcement actions (whether or not we participated or knew about the actions leading to the violations), including fines or penalties, disgorgement of profits and suspension or disqualification from work, including U.S. federal contracting, any of which could materially adversely affect our business, including our results of operations and our reputation.

Changes in laws and regulations could also mandate significant and costly changes to the way we implement our services and solutions or could impose additional taxes on our services and solutions. For example, changes in laws and regulations to limit using off-shore resources in connection with our work or to penalize companies that use off-shore resources, which have been proposed from time to time in various jurisdictions, could adversely affect our results of operations. Such changes may result in contracts being terminated or work being transferred on-shore, resulting in greater costs to us. In addition, these changes could have a negative impact on our ability to obtain future work from government clients.

We have alliances with companies whose capabilities complement our own. A very significant portion of our services and solutions are based on technology or software provided by a few major providers that are our alliance partners. See “Business—Alliances.” The priorities and objectives of our alliance partners may differ from ours. As most of our alliance relationships are non-exclusive, our alliance partners are not prohibited from competing with us or forming closer or preferred arrangements with our competitors. One or more of our key alliance partners may be acquired by a competitor, or key alliancesalliance partners might merge with each other, either of which could reduce our access over time to the technology or software provided by those partners. In addition, our alliance partners could experience reduced demand for their technology or software, including, for example, in response to changes in technology, which

In addition, we rely on third-party software in providing some of our services and solutions. If we lose our ability to continue using such software for any reason, including because it is found to infringe the rights of others, we will need to obtain substitute software or seek alternative means of obtaining the technology necessary to continue to provide such services and solutions. Our inability to replace such software, or to replace such software in a timely or cost-effective manner, could materially adversely affect our results of operations.

Our success depends, in part, upon our ability to protect our proprietary methodologies and other intellectual property. Existing laws of the various countries in which we provide services or solutions offer only limited protection of our intellectual property rights, and the protection in some countries may be very limited. We rely upon a combination of confidentiality policies, nondisclosure and other contractual arrangements, and patent, trade secret, copyright and trademark laws to protect our intellectual property rights. These laws are subject to change at any time and could further limit our ability to protect our intellectual property. There is uncertainty concerning the scope of available intellectual property protection for software and business methods, which are fields in which we rely on intellectual property laws to protect our rights. Our intellectual property rights may not prevent competitors from reverse engineering our proprietary information or independently developing products and services similar to or duplicative of ours. Further, the steps we take in this regard might not be adequate to prevent or deter infringement or other misappropriation of our intellectual property by competitors, former employees or other third parties, and we might not be able to detect unauthorized use of, or take appropriate and timely steps to enforce, our intellectual property rights. Enforcing our rights might also require considerable time, money and oversight, and we may not be successful in enforcing our rights.

We believe the Accenture brand name and our reputation are important corporate assets that help distinguish our services and solutions from those of competitors and also contribute to our efforts to recruit and retain talented employees. However, our corporate reputation is potentially susceptible to material damage by events such as disputes with clients, information technology securitycybersecurity breaches or service outages, internal control deficiencies, delivery failures, compliance violations, government investigations or compliance violations.legal proceedings. Similarly, our reputation could be damaged by actions or statements of current or former clients, directors, employees, competitors, vendors, alliance partners, our joint ventures or joint venture partners, adversaries in legal proceedings, legislators or government regulators, as well as members of the investment community or the media. There is a risk that negative information about Accenture, even if based on rumor or misunderstanding, could adversely affect our business. Damage to our reputation could be difficult, expensive and time-consuming to repair, could make potential or existing clients reluctant to select us for new engagements, resulting in a loss of business, and could adversely affect our recruitment and retention efforts. Damage

As of August 31, 2013,2016, we had approximately 275,000384,000 employees worldwide. Our size and scale present significant management and organizational challenges. It might become increasingly difficult to maintain effective standards across a large enterprise and effectively institutionalize our knowledge. It might also become more difficult to maintain our culture, effectively manage and monitor our personnel and operations and effectively communicate our core values, policies and procedures, strategies and goals, particularly given our world-wide operations. The size and scope of our operations increase the possibility that we will have employees who engage in unlawful or fraudulent activity, or otherwise expose us to unacceptable business risks, despite our efforts to train them and maintain internal controls to prevent such instances. For example, employee misconduct could involve the improper use of our clients’ sensitive or confidential information or the failure to comply with legislation or regulations regarding the protection of sensitive or confidential information. Furthermore, the inappropriate use of social networking sites by our employees could result in breaches of confidentiality, unauthorized disclosure of non-public company information or damage to our reputation. If we do not continue to develop and implement the right processes and tools to manage our enterprise and instill our culture and core values into all of our employees, our ability to compete successfully and achieve our business objectives could be impaired. In addition, from time to time, we have made, and may continue to make, changes to our operating model, including how we are organized, as the needs and size of our business change, and if we do not successfully implement the changes, our business and results of operation may be negatively impacted.

Our financial statements have been prepared in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles. The application of generally accepted accounting principles requires us to make estimates and assumptions about certain items and future events that affect our reported financial condition, and our accompanying disclosure with respect to, among other things, revenue recognition and income taxes. We base our estimates on historical experience, contractual commitments and on various other assumptions that we believe to be reasonable under the circumstances and at the time they are made. These estimates and assumptions involve the use of judgment and are subject to significant uncertainties, some of which are beyond our control. If our estimates, or the assumptions underlying such estimates, are not correct, actual results may differ materially from our estimates, and we may need to, among other things, adjust revenues or accrue additional charges that could adversely affect our results of operations.

We are organized under the laws of Ireland, and a significant portion of our assets are located outside the United States. A shareholder who obtains a court judgment based on the civil liability provisions of U.S. federal or state securities laws may be unable to enforce the judgment against us in Ireland or in countries other than the United States where we have assets. In addition, there is some doubt as to whether the courts of Ireland and other countries would recognize or enforce judgments of U.S. courts obtained against us or our directors or officers based on the civil liabilities provisions of the federal or state securities laws of the United States or would hear actions against us or those persons based on those laws. We have been advised that the United States and Ireland do not currently have a treaty providing for the reciprocal recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters. The laws of Ireland do, however, as a general rule, provide that the judgments of the courts of the United States have the same validity in Ireland as if rendered by Irish Courts. Certain important requirements must be satisfied before the Irish Courts will recognize thea U.S. judgment. The originating court must have been a court of competent jurisdiction, the

Some companies that conduct substantial business in the United States but which have a parent domiciled in certain other jurisdictions have been criticized as improperly avoiding U.S. taxes or creating an unfair competitive advantage over other U.S. companies. Accenture never conducted business under a U.S. parent company and pays U.S. taxes on all of its U.S. operations. Nonetheless, we could be subject to criticism in connection with our incorporation in Ireland.

Our shareholders could have more difficulty protecting their interests than would shareholders of a corporation incorporated in a jurisdiction of the United States. As an Irish company, we are governed by the Companies Acts 1963 to 2012 of Ireland (the “Companies Acts”).Act. The Companies Acts differAct differs in some significant, and possibly material, respects from laws applicable to U.S. corporations and shareholders under various state corporation laws, including the provisions relating to interested directors, mergers and acquisitions, takeovers, shareholder lawsuits and indemnification of directors.

Under Irish law, the duties of directors and officers of a company are generally owed to the company only. Shareholders of Irish companies do not generally have rights to take action against directors or officers of the company under Irish law, and may only do so in limited circumstances. Directors of an Irish company must, in exercising their powers and performing their duties, act with due care and skill, honestly and in good faith with a view to the best interests of the company. Directors have a duty not to put themselves in a position in which their duties to the company and their personal interests might conflict and also are under a duty to disclose any personal interest in any contract or arrangement with the company or any of its subsidiaries. If a director or officer of an Irish company is found to have breached his duties to that company, he could be held personally liable to the company in respect of that breach of duty.

We might choose to raise additional funds through public or private debt or equity financings in order to:

ITEM 1B.    UNRESOLVED STAFF COMMENTS

None.

ITEM 2.    PROPERTIES

We have major offices in the world’s leading business centers, including Boston, Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Sao Paolo,Dublin, Frankfurt, London, Madrid, Milan, Paris, Rome, Bangalore, Beijing, Manila, Mumbai, Sao Paolo, Shanghai, Singapore, Sydney and Tokyo, among others. In total, we have offices and operations in more than 200 cities in 5655 countries around the world. We do not own any material real property. Substantially all of our office space is leased under long-term leases with varying expiration dates. We believe that our facilities are adequate to meet our needs in the near future.

ITEM 3.    LEGAL PROCEEDINGS

ITEM 4.    MINE SAFETY DISCLOSURES

EXECUTIVE OFFICERS OF THE REGISTRANT

Our executive officers and persons chosen to become executive officers as of the date hereof are as follows:

Price Range of Accenture plc Class A Ordinary Shares

Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “ACN.” The New York Stock Exchange is the principal United States market for these shares.

The following table sets forth, on a per share basis for the periods indicated, the high and low sale prices for Accenture plc Class A ordinary shares as reported by the New York Stock Exchange.