Company: CERO
Filing Date: 2025-04-15
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001213900-25-032134
Chunk: 1619

Company: CERO THERAPEUTICS HOLDINGS, INC.
Filing Date: 2025-04-15
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 1619
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. Attrition may lead to higher costs
for hiring and retention, diversion of management time to address retention matters and disrupt the business.

To induce valuable employees to remain at our company, in addition
to salary and cash incentives, we have provided equity-based compensation for retention purposes. Despite our efforts to retain valuable
employees, members of our management, scientific and development teams may terminate their employment with us on short notice. Although
we have employment agreements or consulting agreements with our key employees, these agreements provide for at-will employment, which
means that any of our employees could leave our employment at any time, with or without notice. We do not maintain “key person”
insurance policies on the lives of these individuals or the lives of any of our other employees. Our success also depends on our ability
to continue to attract, retain and motivate highly skilled junior, mid-level and senior managers as well as junior, mid-level and senior
scientific and medical personnel.

46

We will need to continue to grow the size
of our organization, and we may experience difficulties in managing this growth.

As our development, manufacturing
and commercialization plans and strategies develop, we expect to add managerial, operational, sales, R&D, marketing, financial and
other personnel. Current and future growth imposes and will impose significant added responsibilities on members of management, including:

●identifying, recruiting, integrating, maintaining and motivating additional employees;

●managing our internal development efforts effectively, including the clinical and FDA review process for
our product candidates, while complying with our contractual obligations to contractors and other third parties; and

●improving our operational, financial and management controls, reporting systems and procedures.

Our future financial performance
and our ability to commercialize our product candidates will depend, in part, on our ability to effectively manage our growth, and our
management may also have to divert a disproportionate amount of its attention away from day-to-day activities in order to devote a substantial
amount of time to managing these growth activities.

We currently rely, and for
the foreseeable future will continue to rely, in substantial part on certain independent organizations, advisors and consultants. There
can be no assurance that the services of independent organizations, advisors and consultants will continue to be available to us on a
timely basis when needed, or that we can find qualified replacements. We may also be subject to penalties or other liabilities if we mis-classify
employees as consultants. In addition, if we are unable to effectively manage our outsourced activities or if the quality