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	5	+= Business =
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7		-==== Business ====
	7	+Square (SQ) started Square in February 2009 to enable businesses (sellers) to accept card payments, an important capability that was previously inaccessible to many businesses. However, sellers also need innovative solutions to thrive, and Square has since expanded to provide additional products and services to give these businesses access to the same tools as large businesses. This approach aligns with its purpose of economic empowerment, as everything the company do should give sellers accessible, affordable tools to grow their businesses and participate in the economy.{{footnote}}https://fintel.io/doc/sec-sq-square-10k-2018-february-27-17947{{/footnote}}
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9		-The company started Square in February 2009 to enable businesses (sellers) to accept card payments, an important capability that was previously inaccessible to many businesses. However, sellers also need innovative solutions to thrive, and Square has since expanded to provide additional products and services to give these businesses access to the same tools as large businesses. This approach aligns with its purpose of economic empowerment, as everything the company do should give sellers accessible, affordable tools to grow their businesses and participate in the economy.
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11	11	Square is a cohesive commerce ecosystem that helps its sellers start, run, and grow their businesses. The company combine sophisticated software with affordable hardware to enable sellers to turn mobile and computing devices into powerful payment and point-of-sale solutions. Square has high seller acceptance rates and fast onboarding, while maintaining low risk and fraud losses as a result of its approach to risk management that emphasizes data science and machine learning. The company focus on technology and design to create products and services that are cohesive, fast, self-serve, and dependable. These attributes differentiate it in a fragmented industry that forces sellers to stitch together hardware, software, and payments services from multiple vendors.
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13	13	The foundation of its ecosystem is a full service, managed payments offering. Once a seller downloads the Square Point of Sale mobile app, they can quickly and easily take their first payment, because the company can typically bring them onto its system in minutes. With its offering, a seller can accept payments in person via magnetic stripe (a swipe), EMV (Europay, MasterCard, and Visa) (a dip), or NFC (Near Field Communication) (a tap); or online via Square Invoices, Square Virtual Terminal, or the seller’s website or app. Once on its system, sellers gain access to technology and features such as reporting and analytics, next-day settlements, digital receipts, payment dispute and chargeback management, security, and Payment Card Industry (PCI) compliance. In the same way that Square has empowered businesses with fast, simple, and cohesive tools, the company see an opportunity with Cash App to build a similar ecosystem of services for individuals. Currently, its Cash App offers individuals access to a fast, easy way to send and receive money electronically to and from individuals and businesses. The company also offer Cash App customers the ability to use their funds via a Visa debit card. Square has also recently added functionality to Cash App to enable customers to buy and sell bitcoin.
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19	19	The company's ability to add new sellers efficiently, and help them grow their business after they join its platform, has led to continued and sustained growth. The company's existing sellers also represent a sizable opportunity to up-sell and cross-sell products and services with little incremental sales and marketing expense.
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21		-==== Products and Services ====
	19	+= Products and Services =
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23	23	**Managed Payments Solutions**
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59	59	Caviar is its food ordering platform, which is another service the company offer that helps sellers grow and provides a differentiated way to service restaurants, a large target market for managed payments and point-of-sale solutions. This service makes it easy for restaurants to offer food ordering, both pickup and delivery, to their customers, enabling them to expand their sales and grow revenue without additional overhead. Individuals can order food from local restaurants through the Caviar website or mobile app, which is purpose-built to make delivery and pickup fast and easy. Caviar is currently available in many U.S. markets, including but not limited to New York, San Francisco, and Philadelphia, with thousands of partner restaurants. Caviar charges consumers a delivery and service fee per order. The company also charge its partner restaurants a seller fee as a percentage of total food order value.
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61		-==== Square Capital ====
	59	+== Square Capital ==
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63	63	Square Capital, through a partnership with an industrial bank, facilitates the offering of loans to pre-qualified sellers based on real-time payment and point-of-sale data. These customized loan offers eliminate the lengthy (and often unsuccessful) loan application process for the seller, while facilitating prudent risk management. The terms are straightforward for sellers, and once approved, they get their funds quickly, often the next business day. Sellers can use these funds to make investments in their business, such as purchasing inventory or equipment, hiring additional employees, expanding their stores, or opening new locations.
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67	67	Since its public launch in May 2014, Square Capital has facilitated over 400,000 loans and advances, representing $2.5 billion.
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69		-==== Sellers ====
	67	+== Sellers ==
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71	71	The company's sellers represent a diverse range of industries, including retail, services, and food-related businesses. The company serve sellers of various sizes, ranging from a single vendor at a farmers’ market to multi-location businesses. These sellers also span geographies including the United States, Canada, Japan, Australia, and the United Kingdom. The company believe the diversity of its sellers underscores the accessibility and flexibility of its offerings.
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77	77	[[image:https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1512673/000151267318000004/a10kgpvsellersizerev3.jpg]]
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79		-==== Sales and Marketing ====
	77	+= Sales and Marketing =
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81	81	Square has a strong brand and continue to increase awareness of Square among sellers by enhancing its services and fostering rapid adoption through brand affinity, direct marketing, public relations, and strategic partnerships. The company's Net Promoter Score (NPS) has averaged nearly 70 over the past four quarters, which is double the average score for banking providers. The company's high NPS means its sellers recommend its services to others, strengthening its brand and helping to drive efficient customer acquisition.
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85	85	The company's direct, ongoing interactions with its sellers help it tailor offerings to them, at scale, and in the context of their usage. The company use various scalable communication channels, such as email marketing, in-app notifications and messaging, dashboard alerts, and Square Communities, its online forum for sellers, to increase the awareness and usage of its products and services with little incremental sales and marketing expense.
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87		-==== Product Development and Technology ====
	85	+= Product Development and Technology =
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89	89	The company design its products and services to be cohesive, fast, self-serve, and dependable, and the company organize its product teams accordingly, combining individuals from product management, development and engineering, data science, and design.
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119	119	1. The funds are settled from the Acquiring Bank to Square, typically in one to two business days after the date of the transaction.
120	120	1. At the end of each monthly billing cycle, the Issuing Bank sends a statement to the buyer showing their monthly charges. The statement includes a reference to Square as the merchant of record on the billing statement as a prefix to the seller name (denoted as SQ).
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122		-==== Intellectual Property ====
	120	+== Intellectual Property ==
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124	124	The company seek to protect its intellectual property rights by relying on a combination of federal, state, and common law rights in the United States and other countries, as well as on contractual measures. It is its practice to enter into confidentiality, non-disclosure, and invention assignment agreements with its employees and contractors, and into confidentiality and non-disclosure agreements with other third parties, in order to limit access to, and disclosure and use of, its confidential information and proprietary technology. In addition to these contractual measures, the company also rely on a combination of trademarks, trade dress, copyrights, registered domain names, trade secrets, and patent rights to help protect its brand and its other intellectual property.
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130	130	From time to time, the company also incorporate certain intellectual property licensed from third parties, including under certain open source licenses. Even if any such third-party technology did not continue to be available to it on commercially reasonable terms, the company believe that alternative technologies would be available as needed in every case.
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132		-==== Employees ====
	130	+= Employees =
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134	134	As of December 31, 2017, the company had 2,338 full-time employees. The company also engage temporary employees and consultants as needed to support its operations. None of its employees are either represented by a labor union or subject to a collective bargaining agreement. Square has not experienced any work stoppages, and the company consider its relations with its employees to be good.
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136	136	= References =
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