Yelp Inc

ITEM 1A. RISK FACTORS

TheExcept as set forth below, there have been no material changes to the risks factors set forth in the section titled Risk Factors included under Part I, Item 1A of our Annual Report, which describes various risks and uncertainties that could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, cash flows and the trading price of our common stock. You should carefully consider the risks and uncertainties described in the Annual Report before making an investment decision.

If we fail to generate, maintain and recommend sufficient content from our users that consumers find relevant, helpful and reliable, our traffic and revenue will be negatively affected.

Our success depends on our ability to attract consumer traffic with valuable content, which in turn depends on the quantity and quality of the content provided by our users, as well as consumer perceptions of the relevance, helpfulness and reliability of that content. We may be unable to provide consumers with valuable information if our users do not contribute sufficient content or if our users remove content they previously submitted. For example, users may be unwilling to contribute content as a result of concerns that they may be harassed or sued by the businesses they review, instances of which have occurred in the past and may occur again in the future.

Consumers also may not find the content on our platform to be valuable if they do not perceive it as relevant, helpful or reliable. For example, we do not phase out or remove dated reviews, and consumers may view older reviews as less relevant or reliable than more recent reviews. If the high concentration of reviews in our restaurants and shopping categories creates a perception that our platform is primarily limited to these categories, consumers may not believe that we can provide them with helpful information about businesses in other categories and seek that information elsewhere.

Our automated recommendation software is a critical part of our efforts to provide consumers with relevant, helpful and reliable content. However, although we have designed our technology to avoid recommending content that we believe to be biased, unreliable or otherwise unhelpful, we cannot guarantee that our efforts will be successful, or that each of the recommended reviews available on our platform at any given time is useful or reliable. If our automated software does not recommend helpful content or recommends unhelpful content, consumers may reduce or stop their use of our platform.

Even if we are successful in our efforts to generate, maintain and recommend valuable content, our ability to attract consumer traffic may nonetheless be harmed if consumers can find equivalent content through other services. From time to time, other companies copy information from our platform, or from other sources on the internet that may have obtained information from our platform, without our permission, including through website scraping, robots or other means, and publish or aggregate it with other information for their own benefit. This may make them more competitive and may decrease the likelihood that consumers will visit our platform to find the local businesses and information they seek; it may also negatively impact our ability to license content from our platform. Because web scraping is a common method for gathering data for use with AI models, the increasing prevalence of products incorporating AI has exacerbated this risk; we have discovered AI-powered products using content originally from our platform without our permission and expect we will continue to do so from time to time in the future. Though we strive to detect and prevent this third-party conduct, we may not be able to detect it in a timely manner and, even if we could, may not be able to prevent it. In some cases, particularly in the case of third parties operating outside of the United States, our available remedies may be inadequate to protect us against such conduct.

We may acquire or invest in other companies or technologies, which could divert our managements attention, result in additional dilution to our stockholders and otherwise disrupt our operations and harm our operating results. We may also be unable to realize the expected benefits and synergies of any acquisitions or investments.

Our success will depend, in part, on our ability to expand our product offerings and grow our business in response to changing technologies, user and advertiser demands and competitive pressures. In some circumstances, we may determine to do so through the acquisition of complementary businesses or technologies rather than through internal development. For example, on November 6, 2024, we agreed to acquire RepairPal to expand our offerings in the auto services category. Similarly, we may pursue investments in privately held companies in furtherance of our strategic objectives. We have limited experience as a

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company in the complex processes of acquiring and investing in businesses and technologies. The pursuit of potential future acquisitions or investments may divert the attention of management and in many cases causes us to incur expenses in identifying, investigating and pursuing transactions, whether or not they are consummated. If we do not complete an announced strategic transaction, such as our pending acquisition of RepairPal, or we do not complete it within the time frame we anticipate, our business and financial results could be harmed.

Acquisitions that are consummated could result in dilutive issuances of equity securities or the incurrence of debt, which could adversely affect our results of operations. The incurrence of debt in particular could result in increased fixed obligations or include covenants or other restrictions that would impede our ability to manage our operations. In addition, any transactions we announce could be viewed negatively by users, businesses or investors. We may also fail to accurately forecast the financial impact of a transaction, including tax and accounting charges.

We have in the past and may in the future discover liabilities or deficiencies associated with the companies or assets we acquire or invest in that we did not identify in advance, which may result in significant unanticipated costs or losses. The effectiveness of our due diligence review and our ability to evaluate the results of such due diligence are dependent upon the accuracy and completeness of statements and disclosures made by the companies we acquire or their representatives, as well as the limited amount of time in which acquisitions are executed.

In order to realize the expected benefits and synergies of any acquisition that is consummated, we must meet a number of significant challenges that may create unforeseen operating difficulties and expenditures, including:

integrating operations, strategies, services, sites and technologies of an acquired company;

managing the post-transaction business effectively;

retaining and assimilating the employees of an acquired company;

retaining existing customers and strategic partners, and minimizing disruption to existing relationships, as a result of any integration of new personnel or departure of existing personnel;

difficulties in the assimilation of corporate cultures;

implementing and retaining uniform standards, controls, procedures, policies and information systems; and

addressing risks related to the business of an acquired company that may continue to impact the business following the acquisition.

Any inability to integrate services, sites and technologies, operations or personnel in an efficient and timely manner could harm our results of operations. Transition activities are complex and require significant time and resources, and we may not manage the process successfully, particularly if we are managing multiple transactions concurrently. Our ability to integrate complex acquisitions is unproven, particularly with respect to companies that have significant operations or that develop products with which we do not have prior experience. We expect to invest resources to support any future acquisitions, which will result in ongoing operating expenses and may divert resources and management attention from other areas of our business. We cannot assure you that these investments will be successful. Even if we are able to integrate the operations of any acquired company successfully, we may not realize the full benefits of synergies, cost savings, innovation and operational efficiencies that may be possible from the transaction, or we may not achieve these benefits within a reasonable period of time.

Similarly, investments in private companies are inherently risky in that such companies are typically at an early stage of development, may have no or limited revenues, may not be or may never become profitable, may not be able to secure additional funding or their technologies, services or products may not be successfully developed or introduced into the market. The success of any such investment is typically dependent on a liquidity event, such as a public offering or acquisition. If any company in which we invest decreases in value, we could lose all or part of our investment. These risks would be heightened to the extent any such investment is a minority investment in which we have limited management or operational control over the business.

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