TEHG Technovative Group Inc (CE)

ITEM 1A. RISK FACTORS

Risk Factors related to the Business

If we are not able to develop enhancements to our platform that achieve market acceptance and that keep pace with technological developments, our business will be harmed.

Our ability to attract new clients depends in large part on our ability to enhance and improve our platform and to introduce new products and services. In order to grow our business, we must develop products and services that reflect the changing nature of e-commerce. The success of any enhancement to our platform depends on several factors, including timely completion, adequate quality testing, and market acceptance. Any new product or service that we develop may not be introduced in a timely or cost-effective manner, may contain defects, or may not achieve the market acceptance necessary to generate sufficient revenue. If we are unable to successfully develop new products or services, enhance our existing platform to meet customer requirements or otherwise gain market acceptance, our business and operating results will be harmed.

We need to continuously modify and enhance our platform to keep pace with changes in Internet-related hardware, software, communications, and database technologies and standards. If we are unable to respond in a timely and cost-effective manner to these rapid technological developments and changes in standards, our platform may become less marketable, less competitive, or obsolete, and our operating results will be harmed.

We have a limited operating history, which makes it difficult to evaluate our prospects and future operating results.

We incorporated and first launched our platform in 2014. As a result of our limited operating history, our ability to forecast our future operating results is limited and subject to a number of uncertainties, including our ability to plan for and model future growth. Further, in future periods, our revenue could decline for a number of reasons, including any reduction in demand for our platform, increased competition, contraction of our overall market, or our failure, for any reason, to capitalize on growth opportunities. We have encountered and will encounter risks and uncertainties frequently experienced by growing companies in rapidly changing industries, such as the risks and uncertainties described herein. If our assumptions regarding these risks and uncertainties, which we use to plan our business, are incorrect or change, or if we do not address these risks successfully, our operating and financial results could differ materially from our expectations, and our business could suffer.

If we do not develop and market products that respond to needs of our clients, our business and operating results will be affected.

Online business is a highly competitive industry with low barriers of entry. If we do not develop our products in a direction that will attract customers in accordance to the needs of our clients, we will lose our customer base. This will also affect our ability to attract new clients. In addition, our new products could also fail to attract meaningful market acceptance for many reasons.

We are exposed to risk of system failures.

Our business largely depends on the stability of our server. We may face system failures and outages that will disrupt the operation of our website and the platform. System failure could result in several scenarios: damage from fire, power loss, telecommunication failures, computer viruses, physical and electronic break-ins and similar events. If such events occur, it will affect our reputation and the ability to attract and retain clients, which will adversely affect our operating results.

We rely on our marketing efforts and channels to promote our brand and acquire new clients. These efforts may require significant expense and may not be successful.

We will employ various marketing tactics and use a variety of marketing channels to promote our brand, including sponsorships, advertisement, email and social media marketing. If we lose access to one or more of these channels for any reason, we will not be able to promote our brand effectively which could limit our ability to grow. Further, if the marketing activities fail to generate traffic to our website, attract new clients or lead new and renewal sales of our products, our business and operating results could be affected. There is no assurance the result of the marketing efforts. If customer acquisition cost increases, the operating results could also be affected.

If the rate of growth for small and medium businesses and ventures declines it will affect our results adversely.

Our expectations for future revenue growth are based on targeting small and medium businesses or ventures. If there is a decline in the establishment of small and medium businesses and ventures due to market conditions or other factors, this could affect our performance and target market size which could affect our operating results.

Our ability to enhance our products may be harmed if we are unable to attract and retain sufficient research and development staff.

In order to be competitive, we must continue to develop new solutions and modules to add on our existing platform. As we are still growing, there are larger companies hiring similar research and development staffs to our company, who offer more favorable compensation and incentive packages than us. If we cannot attract or retain sufficiently skilled employees, our business and results of operations could be affected.

The success of our products depends heavily on the importance for retailers of having an online presence.

The success of our products is predicated on the assumption that an online presence is, and will continue to be, an important factor in our clients’ abilities to establish, expand and manage their businesses quickly, easily and affordably online. If we are incorrect in this assumption or if the importance of an online presences becomes irrelevant, for example due to the introduction of a new technology or industry standard that supersedes the importance of an online presence or renders our existing or future products obsolete, then our ability to retain existing clients and attract new clients could be adversely affected, which could harm our ability to generate revenue and meet our targets.

If our network or computer systems are breached or unauthorized access to customer data is otherwise obtained, our platform may be perceived as insecure, we may fail to attract new customers, and we may incur significant liabilities.

Use of our platform involves the storage, transmission, and processing of our clients’ proprietary data, including personal or identifying information regarding their customers or employees. Unauthorized access to or security breaches of our platform could result in the loss of data, loss of intellectual property or trade secrets, loss of business, severe reputational damage, which will adversely affect client confidence. It will also cause regulatory investigations and orders, litigation, indemnity obligations, damages for contract breach, penalties for violation of applicable laws, regulations, or contractual obligations, and significant costs for remediation that may include liability for stolen assets or information and repair of system damage that may have been caused, incentives offered to clients or other business partners in an effort to maintain business relationships after a breach, and other liabilities. Notifications related to a security breach regarding or pertaining to any of such service providers could impact our reputation, harm customer confidence, or hurt our sales and expansion into new markets.

Because the techniques used and vulnerabilities exploited to obtain unauthorized access or to sabotage systems change frequently and generally are not identified until they are launched against a target, we may be unable to anticipate these techniques or vulnerabilities or implement adequate preventative measures. We may also experience security breaches that may remain undetected for an extended period.

Real or perceived errors, failures, or bugs in our platform could adversely affect our operating results and growth prospects.

Because our platform is complex, undetected errors, failures, vulnerabilities, or bugs may occur, especially when updates are deployed. Our platform are often used in connection with large-scale computing environments with different operating systems, system management software, equipment, and networking configurations, which may cause errors or failures of our platform, or other aspects of the computing environment into which they are deployed. In addition, deployment of our platform into complicated, large-scale computing environments may expose undetected errors, failures, vulnerabilities, or bugs in our platform. Real or perceived errors, failures, vulnerabilities, or bugs in our platform could result in negative publicity, loss of or delay in market acceptance of our platform, loss of competitive position, or claims by clients for losses sustained by them. The loss due to our errors and omissions may not be covered by any insurance and we may not be able to afford to bear the cost of liabilities arising in connection with security and privacy damages.

We depend on our executive officers and the loss of one or more of these executives or an inability to attract and retain highly skilled employees could adversely affect our business.

Our success depends largely upon the continued services of our executive officers and other key employees. We rely on our leadership team in the areas of research and development, operations, security, marketing, sales, support, general and administrative functions, and on individual contributors in our research and development and operations. From time to time, there may be changes in our executive management team resulting from the hiring or departure of executives, which could disrupt our business. We do not have employment agreements with our executive officers or other key personnel that require them to continue to work for us for any specified period and, therefore, they could terminate their employment with us at any time. The loss of one or more of our executive officers, especially our Chief Executive Officer, or key employees could have an adverse effect on our business.

We are highly dependent upon free trials of our platform and other strategies to drive our sales and revenue. If these strategies fail to continue to generate sales opportunities or do not convert into paying customers, our business and results of operations will be harmed.

We are highly dependent upon our marketing strategy of offering free trials of our platform to generate sales opportunities. This strategy may not be successful in continuing to generate sufficient sales opportunities necessary to increase our revenue. Many early users never convert from the trial version to a paid version of our platform. Further, we often depend on individuals within an organization who initiate the trial versions of our customer service platform and live chat software being able to convince decision makers within their organization to convert to a paid version. Many of these organizations have complex and multi-layered purchasing requirements. To the extent that these users do not become, or are unable to convince others to become, paying customers, we will not realize the intended benefits of this marketing strategy and our ability to grow our revenue will be adversely affected.

Our business is exposed to risks associated with credit card and other online payments, which risks if realized could adversely affect our business.

A majority of our client fees are processed through credit cards and other online payments which are all currently processed through PayPal, a third party payment gateway. Payments made online are subject to inherent risks related to credit card fraud and we cannot guarantee that credit card and other payments processed through our secured payment gateway partners now and in the future will be free of such fraud. Our failure to limit fraudulent transactions conducted through our websites use of a third party payment gateway could hurt our business and harm our reputation.

Risk Factors Related to Our Common Stock

The Common Stock is subject to risks arising from restrictions on reliance on Rule 144 by shell companies or former shell companies.

Under a regulation of the SEC known as “Rule 144,” a person who beneficially owns restricted securities of an issuer and who is not an affiliate of that issuer may sell them without registration under the Securities Act provided that certain conditions have been met. One of these conditions is that such person has held the restricted securities for a prescribed period, which will be 6 months for the Common Stock. However, Rule 144 is unavailable for the resale of securities issued by an issuer that is a shell company (other than a business combination related shell company) or, unless certain conditions are met, that has been at any time previously a shell company. The SEC defines a shell company as a company that has (a) no or nominal operations and (b) either (i) no or nominal assets, (ii) assets consisting solely of cash and cash equivalents; or (iii) assets consisting of any amount of cash and cash equivalents and nominal other assets. Until the Share Exchange Transaction, the Company was a shell company and, while we believe that a result of the reverse acquisition, the Company ceased to be a shell company, the SEC and others whose approval is required in order for shares to be sold under Rule 144 might take a different view.

Rule 144 is available for the resale of securities of former shell companies if and for as long as the following conditions are met:

(i) the issuer of the securities that was formerly a shell company has ceased to be a shell company,

(ii) the issuer of the securities is subject to the reporting requirements of Section 13 or 15(d) of the Exchange Act,

(iii) the issuer of the securities has filed all Exchange Act reports and material required to be filed, as applicable, during the preceding 12 months (or such shorter period that the issuer was required to file such reports and materials), other than Current Reports on Form 8-K; and

(iv) at least one year has elapsed from the time that the issuer filed current comprehensive disclosure with the SEC reflecting its status as an entity that is not a shell company known as “Form 10 Information.”

Our shares of common stock are subject to penny stock regulations.  Because our common stock is a penny stock, holders of our common stock may find it difficult or may be unable to sell their shares.

The SEC has adopted rules that regulate broker/dealer practices in connection with transactions in penny stocks. Penny stocks generally are equity securities with a price of less than $5.00 (other than securities registered on certain national securities exchanges or quoted on the NASDAQ system, provided that current price and volume information with respect to transactions in such securities is provided by the exchange system).  The penny stock rules require a broker/dealer, prior to a transaction in a penny stock not otherwise exempt from the rules, to deliver a standardized risk disclosure document prepared by the SEC that provides information about penny stocks and the nature and level of risks in the penny stock market.  The broker/dealer also must provide the customer with bid and offer quotations for the penny stock, the compensation of the broker/dealer, and its salesperson in the transaction, and monthly account statements showing the market value of each penny stock held in the customer’s account.  In addition, the penny stock rules require that prior to a transaction in a penny stock not otherwise exempt from such rules, the broker/dealer must make a special written determination that a penny stock is a suitable investment for the purchaser and receive the purchaser’s written agreement to the transaction.  These disclosure requirements may have the effect of reducing the level of trading activity in any secondary market for a stock that becomes subject to the penny stock rules, and accordingly, holders of our common stock may find it difficult or may be unable to sell their shares.

Our stock price may be volatile and you may not be able to resell your shares at or above the price you paid.  In addition, volatility in the price of our common stock may subject us to securities litigation resulting in substantial costs and liabilities and diverting management’s attention and resources.

The market price of our common stock is likely to be highly volatile and could fluctuate widely in price in response to various factors, many of which are beyond our control, including the following:

FINRA sales practice requirements may also limit a stockholder’s ability to buy and sell our stock.

In addition to the “penny stock” rules described above, FINRA has adopted Rule 2111 that requires a broker-dealer to have reasonable grounds for believing that an investment is suitable for a customer before recommending the investment.  Prior to recommending speculative low priced securities to their non-institutional customers, broker-dealers must make reasonable efforts to obtain information about the customer’s financial status, tax status, investment objectives and other information.  Under interpretations of these rules, FINRA believes that there is a high probability that speculative low priced securities will not be suitable for at least some customers.  The FINRA requirements make it more difficult for broker-dealers to recommend that their customers buy our common stock, which may limit your ability to buy and sell our stock and have an adverse effect on the market for our shares.

Because we are a small company with limited operating history, stockholders may find it difficult to sell our common stock in the public markets.

Our common stock is currently traded on Over-the-Counter (“OTC”) Market under the symbol “TEHG.” The number of persons interested in purchasing our common stock at or near bid prices at any given time may be relatively small. This situation is attributable to a number of factors, including the fact that we are a small company which is still relatively unknown to stock analysts, stock brokers, institutional investors, and others in the investment community that generate or influence sales volume, and that even if we came to the attention of such persons, they tend to be risk-averse and would be reluctant to follow an unproven company such as ours or purchase or recommend the purchase of our common stock until such time as we became more viable.  Additionally, many brokerage firms may not be willing to effect transactions in our securities.  As a consequence, there may be periods of several days or more when trading activity in our common stock is minimal or non-existent, as compared to a seasoned issuer which has a large and steady volume of trading activity that will generally support continuous sales without an adverse effect on the stock price.  We cannot give you any assurance that an active public trading market for our common stock will ever develop or be sustained, or that trading levels will be sustained.

Future issuances of our preferred stock could dilute the voting and other rights of holders of our common stock.

Our board of directors has the authority to issue shares of preferred stock in any series and may establish, from time to time, various designations, powers, preferences and rights of the shares of each such series of preferred stock.  Any issuances of preferred stock may have priority over the common stock with respect to dividend or liquidation rights.  Any future issuance of preferred stock may have the effect of delaying, deferring or preventing a change in control of our company and may adversely affect the voting and other rights of the holders of our Common Stock.

If we are unable to comply with the financial reporting requirements mandated by the SEC’s regulations, investors may lose confidence in our financial reporting and the price of our common stock could decline.

If we fail to maintain effective internal controls over financial reporting, our ability to produce timely, accurate and reliable periodic financial statements could be impaired.  If we do not maintain adequate internal control over financial reporting, investors could lose confidence in the accuracy of our periodic reports filed under the Exchange Act.  Additionally, our ability to obtain additional financing could be impaired or a lack of investor confidence in the reliability and accuracy of our public reporting could cause our stock price to decline.

If securities or industry analysts do not publish research or reports about our business, if they adversely change their recommendations regarding our common stock, or if our operating results do not meet their expectations, our stock price and trading volume could decline.

The trading market for our common stock will be influenced by the research and reports that securities or industry analysts publish about us or our business. We do not currently have, and may never obtain, research coverage by securities analysts. We do not have any control over these reports or analysts. If any of the analysts who cover our company downgrades our stock, or if our operating results do not meet the analysts’ expectations, our stock price could decline. Moreover, if any of these analysts ceases coverage of our company or fails to publish regular reports on our business, we could lose visibility in the financial markets, which in turn could cause our stock price and trading volume to decline.

Our management and Board of Directors control a substantial percentage of our stock and therefore have the ability to exercise substantial control over our affairs .

As of the date of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, our directors, executive officers and our largest shareholder whose representative serves on our Board of Directors owned approximately 94% of our outstanding common stock in the aggregate. Because of the large percentage of stock held by our directors, executive officers and largest shareholder whose representative serves on our Board of Directors, these persons could influence the outcome of any matter submitted to a vote of our stockholders.

We do not know whether an active, liquid and orderly trading market will develop for our securities or what the market price of our securities will be and as a result it may be difficult for you to sell your shares of common stock.

There is currently an illiquid market for our securities and an active trading market for our securities may never develop or be sustained. As a result of these and other factors, should you purchase shares of our common stock from current shareholders, you may be unable to resell our common stock. The lack of an active market may impair your ability to sell those securities at the time you wish to sell them or at a price that you consider reasonable. The lack of an active market may also reduce the fair market value of your securities. Further, an inactive market may also impair our ability to raise capital by selling securities and may impair our ability to enter into collaborations or acquire companies or products by using our securities as consideration.

Insiders have substantial influence over us and could delay or prevent a change in corporate control.

Our executive officers, directors and our largest shareholder whose representative serves on the Board of Directors collectively owned approximately 94% of our outstanding voting stock. This concentration of ownership could harm the market price of our securities by:

The interests of this group of stockholders may not always coincide with your interests or the interests of other stockholders and they may act in a manner that advances their best interests and not necessarily those of other stockholders, including seeking a premium value for their securities, and might negatively affect the prevailing market price for our securities.

If we do not meet the listing standards of a national securities exchange our investors’ ability to make transactions in our securities will be limited and we will be subject us to additional trading restrictions.

Our securities currently are traded over-the-counter on the OTC Pink market and are not qualified to be listed on a national securities exchange, such as NASDAQ. Accordingly, we face significant material adverse consequences, including:

The National Securities Markets Improvement Act of 1996, which is a federal statute, prevents or preempts the states from regulating the sale of certain securities, which are referred to as “covered securities.” Since our common stock is traded on the OTC Pink, our common stock is a covered security. Although the states are preempted from regulating the sale of our securities, the federal statute allows the states to investigate companies if there is a suspicion of fraud, and, if there is a finding of fraudulent activity, then the states can regulate or bar the sale of covered securities in a particular case. Further, if we were no longer traded over-the-counter, our common stock would not be a covered security and we would be subject to regulation in each state in which we offer our securities.

If we fail to maintain an effective system of internal control over financial reporting in the future, we may not be able to accurately report our financial condition, results of operations or cash flows, which may adversely affect investor confidence in us and, as a result, the value of our securities.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires, among other things, that we maintain effective internal controls for financial reporting and disclosure controls and procedures. In our annual reports on Form 10-K, we are required, under Section 404(a) of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, to furnish a report by management on, among other things, the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting. This assessment needed to include disclosure of any material weaknesses identified by our management in our internal control over financial reporting. A material weakness is a deficiency, or combination of deficiencies, in internal control over financial reporting that results in more than a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of annual or interim financial statements will not be prevented or detected on a timely basis. Section 404(b) of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act also generally requires an attestation from our independent registered public accounting firm on the effectiveness of our internal control over financial reporting. However, for as long as we remain a non-accelerated filer we intend to take advantage of the exemption permitting us not to comply with the independent registered public accounting firm attestation requirement.

Our compliance with Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires that we incur substantial accounting expense and expend significant management efforts. We currently do not have an internal audit group, and we will need to hire additional accounting and financial staff with appropriate public company experience and technical accounting knowledge, and compile the system and process documentation necessary to perform the evaluation needed to comply with Section 404. We may not be able to complete our evaluation, testing and any required remediation in a timely fashion. During the evaluation and testing process, if we identify one or more material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting, we will be unable to assert that our internal control over financial reporting is effective. We cannot assure you that there will not be material weaknesses or significant deficiencies in our internal control over financial reporting in the future. Any failure to maintain internal control over financial reporting could severely inhibit our ability to accurately report our financial condition, results of operations or cash flows. If we are unable to conclude that our internal control over financial reporting is effective, or if our independent registered public accounting firm determines we have a material weakness or significant deficiency in our internal control over financial reporting, we could lose investor confidence in the accuracy and completeness of our financial reports, the market price of our securities could decline, and we could be subject to sanctions or investigations by the SEC or other regulatory authorities. Failure to remedy any material weakness in our internal control over financial reporting, or to implement or maintain other effective control systems required of public companies, could also restrict our future access to the capital markets.

Our disclosure controls and procedures may not prevent or detect all errors or acts of fraud.

Our disclosure controls and procedures are designed to reasonably assure that information required to be disclosed by us in reports we file or submit under the Exchange Act is accumulated and communicated to management, recorded, processed, summarized and reported within the time periods specified in the rules and forms of the SEC. We believe that any disclosure controls and procedures or internal controls and procedures, no matter how well conceived and operated, can provide only reasonable, not absolute, assurance that the objectives of the control system are met.

These inherent limitations include the realities that judgments in decision-making can be faulty, and that breakdowns can occur because of simple error or mistake. Additionally, controls can be circumvented by the individual acts of some persons, by collusion of two or more people or by an unauthorized override of the controls. Accordingly, because of the inherent limitations in our control system, misstatements or insufficient disclosures due to error or fraud may occur and not be detected.

Because we do not anticipate paying any cash dividends on our capital stock in the foreseeable future, capital appreciation, if any, will be your sole source of gain.

We have never declared or paid cash dividends on our capital stock. We currently intend to retain all of our future earnings, if any, to finance the growth and development of our business. In addition, the terms of any future debt agreements may preclude us from paying dividends. As a result, capital appreciation, if any, of our securities will be your sole source of gain for the foreseeable future.

Future sales and issuances of our common stock or rights to purchase common stock, including pursuant to our equity incentive plans, will result in additional dilution of the percentage ownership of our stockholders and could cause our trading price to fall.

We expect that significant additional capital will be needed in the future to continue our planned operations. To raise capital, we may sell substantial amounts of common stock or securities convertible into or exchangeable for common stock. These future issuances of equity or equity-linked securities, together with the exercise of stock options and warrants granted in the future and any additional shares issued in connection with acquisitions, if any, may result in material dilution to our investors. Such sales may also result in material dilution to our existing stockholders, and new investors could gain rights, preferences and privileges senior to those of holders of our common stock.

Our Board of Directors and stockholders also expects to adopt a s tock option plan to reward employees and consultants with grants of our common stock. Future equity incentive grants and issuances of common stock under our potential future equity incentive plans may have an adverse effect on the market price of our securities.

If there is significant downward pressure on the price of our common stock, it may encourage shareholders to sell shares by means of short sales or otherwise. Short sales involve the sale, usually with a future delivery date, of common stock the seller does not own. Covered short sales are sales made in an amount not greater than the number of shares subject to the short seller’s right to acquire common stock, such as upon exercise of warrants. A holder of warrants may close out any covered short position by exercising all, or a portion, of its warrants, or by purchasing shares in the open market. In determining the source of shares to close out the covered short position, a holder of warrants will likely consider, among other things, the price of common stock available for purchase in the open market as compared to the exercise price of the warrants. The existence of a significant number of short sales generally causes the price of common stock to decline, in part because it indicates that a number of market participants are taking a position that will be profitable only if the price of the common stock declines.