DFS Annual Report

Many of the Company’s GCM clients are companies required by the SEC to file reports pursuant to the Exchange Act, through the SEC’s Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval (EDGAR) system. The EDGAR system requires filers to prepare and submit filings using the SEC’s specified file formats. The Company’s EDGAR filing services assist its GCM clients in preparing Exchange Act filings that are compatible with the EDGAR system, and its employees have expertise and significant experience navigating this process with companies and their advisors. Specifically, many of the Company’s GCM clients are required to file proxy statements pursuant to the Exchange Act, and the Company’s Proxy Design service allows its clients to tailor these proxies by helping them to identify and match an appropriate style and format to their unique corporate culture and proxy-related objectives. The Company serves its GCM clients from local offices in most major cities in the U.S. and international jurisdictions in which the Company has operations. The Company believes that its local teams set the standard for reliable and efficient service and convenience. As part of their regulatory filing requirements, the Company’s GCM clients who submit Exchange Act reports are also required to submit tagged files in the SEC-mandated eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) format. The Company provides these clients with a suite of tagging, review and validation tools to assist them with the XBRL requirements, and the Company has teams of accounting and financing professionals that assist its GCM clients with the processes of tag selection, tag review, file creation, validation and distribution, if required for their Exchange Act filings with the SEC. In addition to the EDGAR filing services it provides, in which it formats and manages the content of the filings on behalf of its clients, the Company also offers a cloud-based disclosure management system called ActiveDisclosure that allows its GCM clients to collaboratively create, review and distribute financial communication and regulatory compliance documents on their own systems and then file directly on the SEC’s EDGAR system and File 16 for Section 16 filings, each of which, with assistance from the Company’s experienced professionals as needed, may reduce the time of the financial close process for its clients. The Company provides services for GCM clients throughout the course of public and private business transactions, including those transactions that are subject to the requirements of the Securities Act. The Company assists many of its clients with certain transaction-related EDGAR filing and print services (including registration statements, prospectuses, offering circulars, proxy statements and XBRL-tagged filings), as well as with the technical aspects of the regulatory filing process. The Company has conferencing facilities in most major cities in the U.S. and the international jurisdictions in which it has operations for in-person working groups to meet to strategize and prepare documents for the transactional deal stream. The Company’s sites are outfitted to provide EDGAR filing capabilities, typesetting, meeting rooms and around-the-clock service. In addition, for both public and private transactions, many of the Company’s GCM clients use its line of Venue products and services to manage the transaction process and increase efficiency. The Company’s Venue Virtual Data Room product is a cloud-based service that allows companies to securely organize, manage, distribute and track corporate governance, financing, legal and other documents in an online workspace accessible to internal and outside advisors alike. The Company’s GCM clients use Venue Virtual Data Rooms for capital markets transactions, mergers and acquisition transactions and other transactions to facilitate their document management and due diligence processes. Venue Deal Marketing is a service provided through Peloton Documents, a company in which the Company has made a strategic investment. The Peloton solution creates interactive transaction related documents that enable companies, investors and advisors to communicate a company’s value and market and manage large, complex deals directly from their data room. Peloton’s technology leverages video and other rich media content as the vehicle to illustrate the value of a business by enabling the user to tell a more dynamic company story to better gauge interest from potential buyers and investors. Users include some of the world’s largest investment banks and private equity firms. Global Investment Markets The Company provides products and services to clients operating in global investment markets (“GIM”) within the United States and internationally, including United States based mutual funds, hedge and alternative investment funds, insurance companies and overseas investment structures for collective investments (similar to mutual funds in the United States). The Company also provides products to third party service providers and custodians who support investment managers, and it sells products and distribution services to the broker networks and financial advisors that distribute and sell investment products. The Company services the top variable annuity and variable life providers and many funds use the Company’s software products to create reports, prospectuses, fact sheets and other marketing and disclosure documents for distribution or submission to investors and regulators. In 2016, approximately 97% of GIM net sales were compliance in nature, while the remaining 3% of GIM net sales were transactional in nature. Of the Company’s total GIM net sales in 2016, approximately 60% were derived from clients in the mutual funds industry and 40% were derived from clients in the healthcare and insurance industries. The Company’s teams currently support clients in the United States, Canada, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Luxembourg, India and Australia, with the Company’s average relationship with GIM clients exceeding 12 years. 4