Quarterlytics / Technology / Hardware, Equipment & Parts / Trimble

Trimble

trmb · NASDAQ Technology
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Ticker trmb
Exchange NASDAQ
Sector Technology
Industry Hardware, Equipment & Parts
Employees 5001-10,000
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FY2014 Annual Report · Trimble
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2014
Annual Report

Transforming the way the world works

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To Our
Shareholders

Trimble’s revenue grew 4.7 percent for the year, well below our 
average of 15.5 percent for the ten-year period of 2003–2013. 
The most challenging factor in the year was the severe 
condition of the agricultural market, which was characterized 
by sharp declines in commodity prices. This, in turn, led to a 
pullback in investments by farmers and lowered our sales. 
Although we have been historically resistant to agricultural 
cyclical downsides because we are selling “productivity” and 
not “capacity,” the extreme conditions caused a sharp decline 
in our Field Solutions segment revenue, which was down 10.9 
percent compared to 2013.    

The rest of the company, excluding the Field Solutions 
segment, grew by 8.8 percent, most of which was organic. 
The growth profile was substantially stronger in the first 
three quarters of the year and was impacted in the fourth 
quarter by exchange rates, the oil price decline and difficult 
year-to-year comparisons to the fourth quarter of 2013. 
Our non-GAAP operating margin slid to 20.0 percent in 2014 
from 20.7 percent in 2013, primarily due to the effects 
of the Field Solutions segment. However, the rest of the 
company, excluding Field Solutions, did maintain the tradition 
of non-GAAP operating margin improvement.  

The “bad news/good news” effect of the differential 
performance within the company is that Trimble has rapidly 

become less reliant on agriculture for its margin performance. 
Over the last two years, the share of total company non-GAAP 
operating income from the Field Solutions segment has 
declined from 47 percent to 29 percent in 2014. The “bad 
news” is that the Field Solutions segment’s non-GAAP 
operating income has declined by 25 percent over two 
years. The “good news” is that the rest of the company 
has grown by more than 60 percent in the same period. 

Although the agricultural cyclical effect is dominating 
Trimble’s current picture, it is not the complete story. 
The short-term impact is disguising some strong secular 
trends that provide the foundation for long-term growth. 
These trends are enabled by Trimble’s ambitious corporate 
self-definition, which focuses on creating transformational 
changes in work flows in vertical markets through the 
application of technology.  

One of these transformational changes is within agriculture. 
Farming’s future will increasingly be tied to using information to 
make informed decisions in all phases of the farm cycle—from 
crop planning through harvest. Our response to this challenge 
is what we call Connected Farm™ solutions. The Connected 
Farm will require competencies in precision positioning, 
discrete sensors, sensor fusion, wireless communication, 
data architectures, analytics and the ability to apply the 

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We had varying performance across our business portfolio in 2014, with lower results than the historical Trimble performance standard, primarily due to weakness in the Field Solutions segment driven by agriculture. The rest of the company, outside of the Field Solutions segment, demonstrated growth and improved financial performance. Across the company, 2014 was a year of significant strategic development from both a solution-set and go-to-market perspective.decisions in the field. It will lead to an altered business model 
for Trimble, which will be based on growing service revenue. 
Despite the current pressure on our agricultural profitability, 
we have continued to invest in a robust development program. 
Trimble has a unique combination of capabilities with 
significant competencies across the required technological 
range as well as significant and growing domain knowledge. 
We extended our market presence during 2014 with the 
introduction of irrigation solutions to the Connected Farm.  

The same type of industry transition is occurring in construction, 
although probably at a faster rate. Construction represents a 
significantly larger market than agriculture and is inherently 
more complex. Evidence is growing that project savings of up 
to 30 percent are possible through the holistic application of 
technology in the construction work process. Trimble’s unique 
contribution to this change is built around a core unifying 
concept we call the “constructible model,” which is a much 
richer and robust concept than traditional geometric models. 
Trimble’s uniqueness also derives from our ability to convert 
the model intelligence into practical hardware solutions 
through tight integration.  

During 2014 we significantly extended our ability to bring 
the constructible model to market with the acquisitions 
of Gehry Technologies and Manhattan Software. Gehry 
Technologies provides us both collaborative software tools 
and professional services resources. The professional 
services capability will become increasingly important as it 
will allow us to manage the complexity of integrating multiple 
technologies on a construction project. Manhattan Software 
provides us with facilities management software capability 
and enables a hand-off at the end of a project, allowing the 
constructible model to become the foundation of a facilities 
operating model.                     

The third example of technology-enabled transformation 
is that of transportation and logistics. The transportation 
industry can be broadly characterized as under pressure 
from tight margins and growing regulatory requirements. 
Technology is an essential element in improving productivity, 
reducing costs and meeting compliance requirements. 
Trimble provides solutions at both the mobile and the 
enterprise level. The mobile element is centered on fleet 
management, whereas the enterprise solution is focused on 
the transactions needed to run the transportation business.

Multiple examples of these types of transformation allow us 
to continue to believe in Trimble as a company with access to a 
significant unpenetrated addressable market. During the first 
half of 2015 we anticipate we will face some headwinds that 
will temporarily impact our underlying growth profile, including 
the stronger U.S. dollar, oil price declines and accounting 
effects from recent acquisitions. We expect these effects 
will dissipate in the second half and the business outlook 
will progressively improve during 2015, better reflecting the 
underlying growth dynamics in many areas of the company.   

This transformation is worldwide and our access to international 
markets remains a key to our success. Although we already 
have an international profile, with more than 50 percent 
of 2014 revenue outside the U.S., we expect to accelerate 
our efforts to penetrate markets outside of our traditional 
comfort zone.  

We expect 2015 to be a rich year for new products, many 
of which will be market extenders or penetrators. Trimble 
Leap™ and the R1 GNSS receiver both fall in that category. 
They are in the “bring your own device” category, which has 
the potential to democratize, and grow, a number of Trimble’s 
existing markets. They combine a low-cost, high-accuracy 
GNSS receiver with Trimble software that pairs directly with 
smartphones and tablets. High accuracy is achieved with 
real-time corrections from Trimble’s ViewPoint RTX™ service. 
Potential users include an expanded universe of GIS users 
as well as existing and new users in construction and land 
administration. Although these examples are not necessarily 
the most significant revenue producers, they do provide a 
sense of the incredibly active technology environment in 
which Trimble is participating.

Trimble continues to maintain a strong financial position. We 
are leveraging strong operating cash flows and our balance 
sheet to invest internally and through strategic acquisitions that 
add value to the overall portfolio. Deferred revenue increased 
to a record level in 2014, reflecting continued changes in the 
mix of our revenue toward software and subscription offerings, 
and we expect this trend to continue. In the fourth quarter, we 
were pleased to complete a $400 million investment grade 
senior notes offering, which effectively extends the term for 
a portion of our debt that we believe to be long-term in nature. 
The demand for the offering was a clear indication of the 
market view of the company’s strategic and financial strengths.

We continue to pursue a very ambitious path. We stumbled in 
2014 and will face challenges in early 2015, but remain fixed 
on value creation through our basic goals of:

  •  Breakout market leadership—achieved by leading 

transformations in our markets;  

  •  Top-tier financial performance—focused on revenue 
growth, incremental margin performance and return  
on equity;

  •  A new standard of excellence that transcends best 

current practices—focused on following a unique path 
emphasizing “always better.”

Once again I thank the Trimble employees for their continued 
competency, commitment and loyalty.   

Steven W. Berglund 
President and Chief Executive Officer

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Financial
Highlights

REVENUE
in US $ millions

NON-GAAP OPERATING INCOME
in US $ millions

CASH FLOW FROM OPERATIONS
in US $ millions

2,500

2,250

2,000

1,750

1,500

1,250

1,000

750

500

250

0
0

12

13

14

500

400

300

200

100

0

12

13

14

500

400

300

200

100

0

12

13

14

COMPARISON OF 5-YEAR CUMULATIVE TOTAL RETURN*
Among Trimble Navigation Limited, the NASDAQ Composite index and the S&P Information Technology index.

$300

$250

$200

$150

$100

$50

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

Trimble Navigation Limited

NASDAQ Composite

S&P Information Technology

The above graph compares the cumulative 5-year total return provided shareholders on Trimble Navigation Limited’s common stock relative 
to the cumulative total returns of the NASDAQ Composite index and the S&P Information Technology index. An investment of $100 (with 
reinvestment of all dividends) is assumed to have been made in our common stock and in each of the indices on 12/31/2009 and its relative 
performance is tracked through 12/31/2014. The Company has never paid dividends on its common stock and has no present plans to do so.

*The Company adopted a 52-53 week fiscal year effective upon the end of fiscal year 1997 and the actual date of the Company’s 2014 fiscal year 
end was January 2, 2014. Any variations due to any differences between the actual date of a particular fiscal year end and the calendar year end 
for such year are not expected to be material.

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Management
Information

EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT 

Steven W. Berglund 
President and Chief Executive Officer

J. Erik Arvesen 
Vice President, Geospatial Division

James A. Kirkland 
Vice President, General Counsel

Leah K. Lambertson 
Vice President, Operations  
and Chief Information Officer

Michael Lesyna 
Vice President, Strategy  
and Corporate Development

Julie A. Shepard 
Vice President, Finance  
and Chief Accounting Officer

Jerry W. Lo 
Vice President, Tax

Roz Buick, Ph.D. 
Vice President, Heavy Civil  
Construction Division

Joseph F. Denniston, Jr. 
Vice President, Agriculture Division

Christopher J. Shephard 
Vice President, OEM Solutions  
and Mining Division 

Douglas R. Brent 
Vice President, Technology Innovation

Ann M. Ciganer 
Vice President, Strategic Policy

John E. Huey 
Vice President, Treasurer

Prakash Iyer 
Vice President, Software  
Architecture and Strategy

Francois Delepine 
Chief Financial Officer

Bryn A. Fosburgh 
Vice President

Christopher W. Gibson 
Vice President

Mark A. Harrington 
Vice President

Jürgen Kleim 
Vice President

James M. Veneziano 
Vice President

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Ulf J. Johansson, Ph.D 
Chairman 
Business Consultant and 
Director, Telefon AB LM Ericsson

Nickolas W. Vande Steeg 
Vice Chairman 
Chairman, University of APU 
Chairman, Bedrock Creek 
Director, Gardner Denver Inc. 
Director, Wabtec Corporation

Steven W. Berglund 
President and Chief Executive Officer

John B. Goodrich 
Secretary 
Business Consultant

Merit E. Janow 
Dean, School of International 
and Public Affairs, and Professor 
of Practice Columbia University

Ronald S. Nersesian 
President and Chief Executive Officer, 
Keysight Technologies

Mark S. Peek 
Chief Financial Officer, Workday

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LOCATIONS

Australia

Austria

Belgium

Brazil

Canada

Chile

China

Denmark

Finland

France

Germany

Ghana

Hong Kong

Hungary

India

Indonesia

Ireland

Italy

Japan

Korea

Lithuania

Malaysia

Mexico

Netherlands

New Zealand

Russia

Saudi Arabia

Singapore

South Africa

Spain

Sweden

Switzerland

Thailand

United Arab Emirates

United Kingdom

United States of America

CORPORATE HEADQUARTERS

SHAREHOLDER INFORMATION

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Trimble Navigation Limited 
935 Stewart Drive 
Sunnyvale, California 94085

+1 (408) 481-8000

www.trimble.com

Independent Auditor

Ernst & Young LLP 
San Jose, California

Transfer Agent & Registrar

American Stock  
Transfer & Trust Company 
6201 15th Avenue 
Brooklyn, New York 11219

+1 (800) 937-5449 
www.amstock.com 
info@amstock.com

Investor Relations Contact

+1 (408) 481-7838 
investor_relations@trimble.com

The Company’s annual report on Form 
10-K, as filed with the Securities 
Exchange Commission, accompanies 
this annual report to shareholders and is 
also available on the Investor Relations 
section of the Company’s website at 
www.trimble.com

TRIMBLE INVESTOR INFORMATION

Traded: The NASDAQ Stock Exchange 
Symbol: TRMB

©2015, Trimble Navigation Limited. All rights reserved. Trimble, the Globe and Triangle logo are registered trademarks in the United States and/or in 
other countries. Connected Farm, Trimble Leap and ViewPoint RTX are trademarks of Trimble Navigation Limited. All other trademarks are the property 
of their respective owners.

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