Significant developments or changes in national laws or policies to protect or promote domestic interests and/or address foreign competition, including laws and policies in areas such as trade, manufacturing, government purchasing, healthcare, intellectual property, regulatory enforcement and investment/development, can adversely affect our business and financial statements. The U.S. has announced and/or implemented significant new tariffs on imports from a wide range of countries, which has prompted retaliatory tariffs by a number of countries and a cycle of retaliatory tariffs by both the U.S. and other countries. Subsequently, actions have been taken by the U.S. and certain other countries to modify certain of these tariffs and/or delay their effective dates, and the U.S. has entered into trade agreements with certain countries implementing new tariffs. In February 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (“IEEPA”), which the U.S. administration relied on to impose certain tariffs, does not authorize the administration to impose tariffs. In response, the administration announced plans to implement new tariffs under alternative statutory authority. The full impact of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling and the administration’s response remain uncertain; as of the date of this Annual Report, a number of tariffs issued by the United States and other countries remain in effect.
Collectively, these tariffs increase the cost to us of supplies and components we import, which in turn has required and will require us to implement surcharges and/or increase the price of certain of our products, among other countermeasures; can increase the cost to our customers of certain of our finished goods, which together with the surcharges and price increases noted above can adversely impact demand for our products and our competitive positioning; could adversely impact the availability to us of certain products in certain countries and disrupt our supply chains, with related impacts to our operations; and could exacerbate inflation, diminish investment and result in broader negative impacts including increased political and economic instability and capital markets dislocation that may adversely impact demand for our products. In addition, whenever we are unable to fully recover higher costs, or whenever there is a time delay between the increase in costs and our ability to recover these costs, our margins and profitability are adversely affected. The full impact of the U.S. Supreme Court’s February 2026 ruling and the administration’s response remain uncertain, the U.S. may implement additional tariffs and other measures, further retaliatory tariffs and other retaliatory actions may follow and the risks and adverse effects noted above may increase. Please see “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” for further discussion of the impact of these tariffs. Though the risks identified above in certain cases have already adversely impacted parts of our business, the full impact of these tariffs and other actions on the Company and on our business partners remains highly uncertain and subject to rapid change.
In addition, certain governments have implemented policies to induce “re-shoring” of supply chains, reduce reliance on imported supplies and promote national production. For example, the Chinese government has issued a series of policies in the past several years to promote the development and use of local medical devices.