8-K

UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20549

FORM 8-K

CURRENT REPORT

Pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d)

of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934

Date of Report (Date of earliest event reported): May 27, 2021

AVALARA, INC.

(Exact name of Registrant as Specified in Its Charter)


Washington	001-38525	91-1995935
(State or Other Jurisdiction of Incorporation)	(Commission File Number)	(IRS Employer Identification No.)

255 South King Street, Suite 1800 Seattle, WA		98104
(Address of Principal Executive Offices)		(Zip Code)

Registrant’s Telephone Number, Including Area Code: (206) 826-4900

Not Applicable

(Former Name or Former Address, if Changed Since Last Report)

Check the appropriate box below if the Form 8-K filing is intended to simultaneously satisfy the filing obligation of the registrant under any of the following provisions (see General Instructions A.2. below):

☐	Written communications pursuant to Rule 425 under the Securities Act (17 CFR 230.425)

☐	Soliciting material pursuant to Rule 14a-12 under the Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.14a-12)

☐	Pre-commencement communications pursuant to Rule 14d-2(b) under the Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.14d-2(b))

☐	Pre-commencement communications pursuant to Rule 13e-4(c) under the Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.13e-4(c))

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:


Title of each class	Trading Symbol(s)	Name of each exchange on which registered
Common Stock, Par Value $0.0001 Per Share	AVLR	New York Stock Exchange

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is an emerging growth company as defined in Rule 405 of the Securities Act of 1933 (§230.405 of this chapter) or Rule 12b-2 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (§240.12b-2 of this chapter).

Emerging growth company ☐

If an emerging growth company, indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a) of the Exchange Act. ☐

Item 8.01 Other Events.

In connection with the Avalara, Inc. (“Avalara”) 2021 virtual analyst day, on May 27, 2021, we disclosed changes to the methodologies by which we calculate Core Customers and Net Revenue Retention rate. Additional information regarding the virtual analyst day, including a link to the webcast and the full slide deck, are available on Avalara’s investor relations website.

Core Customers

We believe core customers is a key indicator of our market penetration, growth, and potential future revenue. We use core customers as a metric to focus our customer count reporting on our primary target market segment.

We define a core customer as:

•

a unique account identifier in our primary U.S. billing systems (multiple companies or divisions within a single consolidated enterprise that each have a separate unique account identifier are each treated as separate customers);

•

that is active as of the measurement date; and

•

for which we have recognized, as of the measurement date, greater than $3,000 in total revenue during the previous twelve months.

Currently, our core customer count includes only customers with unique account identifiers in our primary U.S. billing systems and does not include customers that subscribe to our solutions through our international subsidiaries and certain legacy and acquired billing systems that have not yet been integrated into our primary U.S. billing systems (e.g., recent acquisitions and our lodging tax compliance solution). As we increase our international operations and sales in future periods, we may add customers billed from our international subsidiaries to the core customer metric.

Prior to May 2021, revenue from our Streamlined Sales Tax solution (SST) was not included in our calculation of total revenue during the previous twelve months. This meant customers that would have otherwise met the definition of a core customer, with inclusion of attributable SST revenue, were excluded from our core customer count as well as our disclosures on the percentage of total revenue attributable to core customers. In May 2021, we revised the methodology for core customers to include revenue from SST.

We believe these changes improve the usefulness of this key business metric, which is to measure both the growth of existing customers into core customers and the acquisition of new customers of a certain size.

We also have a substantial number of customers of various sizes that do not meet the revenue threshold to be considered a core customer. Many of these customers are in the emerging and small business segment of the marketplace, which represents strategic value and a growth opportunity for us. Customers who do not meet the revenue threshold to be considered a core customer provide us with market share and awareness, and we anticipate that some may grow into core customers. In addition, we have numerous enterprise-level customers that only utilize our services for small segments of their business, providing opportunities over time for us to extend our relationship and make them core customers.


	Mar 31, 2021		Dec 31, 2020		Sep 30, 2020		Jun 30, 2020		Mar 31, 2020
Core Customers (as reported)		15,580		14,890		14,180		13,560		12,940
Core Customers (revised)		15,730		15,020		14,300		13,640		13,000

Net Revenue Retention Rate

We believe that our net revenue retention rate provides insight into our ability to retain and grow revenue from our customers, as well as their potential long-term value to us. We also believe it reflects the stability of our revenue base, which is one of our core competitive strengths. We calculate our net revenue retention rate by dividing (a) total revenue in the current quarter from any billing accounts that generated revenue during the corresponding quarter of the prior year by (b) total revenue in such corresponding quarter from those same billing accounts. This calculation includes changes during the period for such billing accounts, such as additional solutions purchased, changes in pricing and transaction volume, and terminations, but does not reflect revenue for new billing accounts added during the one-year period.

Our net revenue retention rate includes only customers with unique account identifiers in our primary U.S. billing systems and does not include customers who subscribe to our solutions through our international subsidiaries or certain legacy and acquired billing systems that have not been integrated into our primary U.S. billing systems.

Prior to May 2021, SST was not included in our reported net revenue retention rate. This meant that revenue expansion from existing customers adopting our SST solution was not included, while revenue contraction from customers replacing one or more of Avalara’s other solutions with SST was included. In May 2021, we revised the calculation methodology for net revenue retention rate to include revenue from SST. In addition, professional services revenue is no longer included in the revised calculation methodology, as these services tend to be more one-time in nature.

We believe these changes improve the usefulness of this key business metric, which is to measure our ability to retain and grow revenue from existing customers over time.


	Mar 31, 2021			Dec 31, 2020			Sep 30, 2020			Jun 30, 2020			Mar 31, 2020
Net revenue retention rate (as reported)		107	%		104	%		108	%		107	%		109	%
Net revenue retention rate (revised)		113	%		115	%		116	%		114	%		117	%


	AVALARA, INC.

Date: May 27, 2021	By:	/s/ Alesia L. Pinney
		Alesia L. Pinney Executive Vice President, Chief Legal Officer, and Secretary