Company: BSX
Filing Date: 2025-02-18
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0000885725-25-000011
Chunk: 39

Company: BOSTON SCIENTIFIC CORP
Filing Date: 2025-02-18
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 39
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 mix of internal resources and contract sterilizers to perform this service. To the extent we or our contract sterilizers are unable to sterilize our products, whether due to capacity, availability of materials for sterilization, regulatory or other constraints, including evolving federal and state regulations on the use of ethylene oxide, we may be unable to transition to alternative internal or external resources or methods in a timely or cost effective manner or at all, which could have a material impact on our results of operations and financial condition. Additionally, U.S. and international governments have or are considering adopting regulations on the use of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), and primary manufacturers of PFAS materials have announced that they are discontinuing the supply of such materials. These changes could have an adverse impact on our ability to manufacture or supply certain products in a timely or cost effective manner or at all. These and other environmental laws and regulations may have additional impacts on us or our suppliers, or result in liability to us.

We rely on the proper function, availability and security of information technology systems to operate our business and a cyber-attack or other breach of these systems could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition or results of operations. 

We rely on information technology (IT) and operational technology (OT) systems, including technology from third party vendors, to manufacture and ship our products, as well as to process, transmit and store electronic information in our day-to-day operations. Similar to other large multi-national companies, the size and complexity of our IT systems makes them vulnerable to a cyber-attack, malicious intrusion, breakdown, destruction, loss of data privacy, or other significant disruption. Various other factors may also cause system failures or security breaches, including power outages, natural disasters, inadequate or ineffective backups, issues with upgrading or creating new systems or platforms, vulnerabilities in third-party software or services, errors by our staff or third-party service providers, or breaches in the security of these technologies. We may also face operational interruptions as we continue to implement our new global enterprise resource planning (ERP), which began in 2022. Malicious actors may attempt to trick staff to disclose information to gain access to our systems and/or data. International conflicts, including but not limited to the Russia/Ukraine war, conflicts in the Middle East, and tension between China/Taiwan, have also heightened cybersecurity risks on a global basis. If our incident response, disaster recovery, and business continuity plans fail, such failure could result in adverse impacts to our business