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Commitments and Contingencies
 3 Months Ended
Mar. 31, 2022
Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]  
Commitments and Contingencies Commitments and ContingenciesLease and Other Commitments
The Company has entered into various non-cancelable operating lease agreements for its facilities. In the three months ended March 31, 2022, the Company did not enter into any significant new lease agreements.
Additionally, the Company has non-cancelable contractual commitments with its cloud infrastructure provider, network service providers and other vendors. In the three months ended March 31, 2022, the Company entered into several such agreements with terms up to three years for a total purchase commitment of $30.2 million.
In February 2021, the Company entered into a Framework Agreement, as subsequently amended, with Syniverse Corporation (“Syniverse”) and Carlyle Partners V Holdings, L.P. (“Carlyle”) (the “Framework Agreement”), pursuant to which Syniverse would issue to the Company shares of Syniverse common stock in consideration for an investment by the Company of $500.0 million to $750.0 million. In August 2021, Syniverse entered into an Agreement and Plan of Merger (the “Merger Agreement”) with Blue Steel Merger Sub Inc. (the “Merger Sub”) and M-3 Brigade Acquisition II Corp. (“MBAC”), which would result in Syniverse being a wholly owned subsidiary of MBAC (the “Merger”). Concurrently, the Company and MBAC entered into the Twilio Subscription Agreement (the “Subscription Agreement”), pursuant to which the Company agreed, subject to the terms and conditions set forth therein, to subscribe for and purchase, and MBAC agreed to issue and sell to the Company, immediately prior to the closing of the Merger, shares of Class A common stock and, if applicable, shares of Class C common stock for an aggregate amount of $500.0 million to $750.0 million, depending on redemptions by MBAC’s shareholders. In connection with the closing of the investment, the Company and Syniverse (or their respective subsidiaries) would enter into a wholesale agreement.
In February 2022, Syniverse, MBAC and the Merger Sub mutually terminated the Merger Agreement and the related proposed Merger. The parties agreed to this termination because the rate of MBAC shareholder redemptions for the proposed transaction would have left MBAC with insufficient funds to meet the minimum cash condition for closing, which occurred as a result of the recent changes in market conditions. Consequently, the Company will not be purchasing any shares of common stock of, or making any investments in, MBAC.
Notwithstanding the above, the Framework Agreement between the Company, Syniverse and Carlyle remains in full force and effect. Pursuant to the terms and subject to the closing conditions set forth in the Framework Agreement, the parties are pursuing the alternative transaction, whereby the Company will make a minority investment of $500.0 million to $750.0 million in Syniverse and the parties (or their applicable subsidiaries) will enter into a wholesale agreement.
The transaction is expected to close in 2022.
Legal Matters
The City and County of San Francisco (“San Francisco”) has assessed the Company for additional Telephone Users Tax (“TUT”) and Access Line Tax (“ALT”) on certain of the Company’s services for the years 2009 through 2018. The assessments totaled $38.8 million, including interest and penalties. The Company paid the assessments under protest in the third quarter of 2020.
On May 27, 2021, the Company filed a lawsuit against San Francisco in San Francisco Superior Court challenging the assessments. The Company raised numerous defenses to the assessments including that its services are not telecommunications services, application of the taxes to Twilio’s services violates the Internet Tax Freedom Act and San Francisco does not have jurisdiction to impose tax on services provided outside of San Francisco. The Company is seeking refunds of the taxes paid, waivers of interest and penalties, cost of suit and reasonable attorneys’ fees, and other legal and equitable relief as the court deems appropriate. A trial date has been set for March 6, 2023.
The Company believes it has strong arguments against the assessments, but litigation is uncertain and there is no assurance that it will prevail in court. Should the Company lose on one or more of its arguments, it could incur additional losses associated with taxes, interest, and penalties that together, in aggregate, could be material. The Company regularly assesses the likelihood of adverse outcomes resulting from tax disputes such as this and examines all open years to determine the necessity and adequacy of any tax reserves. The Company’s tax reserves are further discussed in Note 10(d) of these condensed consolidated financial statements.
In addition to the litigation discussed above, from time to time, the Company may be subject to legal actions and claims in the ordinary course of business. The Company has received, and may in the future continue to receive, claims from third parties asserting, among other things, infringement of their intellectual property rights. Future litigation may be necessary to defend the Company, its partners and its customers by determining the scope, enforceability and validity of third‑party proprietary rights, or to establish our proprietary rights. The results of any current or future litigation cannot be predicted with certainty, and regardless of the outcome, litigation can have an adverse impact on the Company because of defense and settlement costs, diversion of management resources, and other factors.
Legal fees and other costs related to litigation and other legal proceedings are expensed as incurred and are included in general and administrative expenses in the accompanying condensed consolidated statements of operations.
Indemnification Agreements
The Company has signed indemnification agreements with all of its board members and executive officers. The agreements indemnify the board members and executive officers from claims and expenses on actions brought against the individuals separately or jointly with the Company for certain indemnifiable events. Indemnifiable events generally mean any event or occurrence related to the fact that the board member or the executive officer was or is acting in his or her capacity as a board member or an executive officer for the Company or was or is acting or representing the interests of the Company.
In the ordinary course of business and in connection with our financing and business combinations transactions, the Company enters into contractual arrangements under which it agrees to provide indemnification of varying scope and terms to business partners, customers and other parties with respect to certain matters, including, but not limited to, losses arising out of the breach of such agreements, intellectual property infringement claims made by third parties and other liabilities relating to or arising from the Company’s various products, or its acts or omissions. In these circumstances, payment may be conditional on the other party making a claim pursuant to the procedures specified in the particular contract. Further, the Company’s obligations under these agreements may be limited in terms of time and/or amount, and in some instances, the Company may have recourse against third parties for certain payments. The terms of such obligations may vary.
As of March 31, 2022 and December 31, 2021, no amounts were accrued related to any outstanding indemnification agreements.
Other Taxes
The Company conducts operations in many tax jurisdictions within and outside the United States. In many of these jurisdictions, non-income-based taxes, such as sales, use, telecommunications, and other local taxes are assessed on the Company’s operations. In the last several years the Company has expanded to collect taxes in most jurisdictions where it operates. The Company continues to carry reserves for certain of its prior non-income-based tax exposures in certain jurisdictions when it is both probable that a liability was incurred and the amount of the exposure could be reasonably estimated. These reserves are based on estimates which include several key assumptions including, but not limited to, the taxability of the Company’s services, the jurisdictions in which its management believes it had nexus and the sourcing of revenues to those jurisdictions.
The Company continues to remain in discussions with certain jurisdictions regarding its prior sales and other taxes that it may owe. In the event any of these jurisdictions disagree with management’s assumptions and analysis, the assessment of the Company’s tax exposure could differ materially from management’s current estimates. For example, as described in Note 10(b), the Company is currently involved in legal proceedings with San Francisco City and County challenging their assessment of the Company’s estimated tax liability for a specific period. The $38.8 million assessment of taxes, including interest and penalties, that the Company paid as required in 2020, net of the $11.5 million reserve the Company had accrued for the same period, was recorded as a deposit in other assets in the accompanying condensed consolidated balance sheets.
As of March 31, 2022, the liabilities recorded for these taxes were $26.5 million for domestic jurisdictions and $18.5 million for jurisdictions outside of the United States. As of December 31, 2021, these liabilities were $25.4 million and $17.7 million, respectively.