Item 1A. Risk Factors

Risks related to the U.S. Government’s failure to raise the debt ceiling.

As has been widely reported, the U.S. Government is reportedly approaching its existing statutory limit on the amount of permissible federal debt, and this limit must be raised in order for the U.S. Government to continue to pay its obligations on a timely basis. If the debt ceiling is not raised, it is unclear how the U.S. Government would prioritize its payments towards its various programs and where our payments would fall in that priority list. In addition, all forms of U.S. Government financing, such as performance-based payments and milestone payments may be delayed until the debt crisis is resolved. As described in Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 2, 2021, a significant portion of our products and services are provided under U.S. Government contracts. U.S. Government contracts generally require the contractor to continue to perform on the contract even if the U.S. Government is unable to make timely payments; failure to continue contract performance places the contractor at risk of termination for default. Should conditions occur such that the U.S. Government does not pay us on a timely basis, we would need to finance our continued performance of the impacted contracts from our available cash resources, credit facilities and/or access to the capital markets, if available. An extended delay in the timely payment by the U.S. Government could result in a material adverse effect on our cash flows, results of operations and financial condition.

Our success is highly dependent on our ability to hire and retain a qualified workforce.

Our success is highly dependent upon our ability to hire and retain a workforce with the skills necessary for our businesses to develop and manufacture the products desired by our customers. We need highly skilled personnel in multiple areas including, among others, engineering, manufacturing, information technology, cybersecurity, flight operations, business development and strategy and management. Because many of our businesses experience cyclical demand, they face challenges in maintaining their workforce at levels appropriate to market demand which in the past has necessitated workforce reductions at some of our businesses as demand decreased. Conversely, our businesses sometimes need to increase the size of their workforce in order to keep pace with production needs due to increased customer demand. In addition, from time to time we face challenges that may impact employee retention, such as workforce reductions and facility consolidations and closures, and some of our most experienced employees are retirement-eligible which may adversely impact retention. To the extent that we lose experienced personnel through retirement or otherwise, it is critical for us to develop other employees, hire new qualified employees and successfully manage the transfer of critical knowledge. Competition for skilled employees is intense, and we may incur higher labor, recruiting and/or training costs in order to attract and retain employees with the requisite skills. We may not be successful in hiring or retaining such employees which could adversely impact our business and results of operations.

Moreover, consistent with President Biden’s Executive Order regarding mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations for employees of U.S. government contractors, we recently notified substantially all of our U.S. employees that they would be required to obtain the COVID-19 vaccination prior to December 8, 2021, unless they request and receive a medical or religious accommodation. There is a risk that some of our employees may choose to leave our employment rather than be vaccinated.

Item 2. Unregistered Sales of Equity Securities and Use of Proceeds

The following provides information about our third quarter 2021 repurchases of equity securities that are registered pursuant to Section 12 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended:

** These shares were purchased pursuant to a plan authorizing the repurchase of up to 25 million shares of Textron common stock that was announced on February 25, 2020, which had no expiration date.*

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