Use of Non-GAAP Financial Measures
To supplement our consolidated financial statements, which are prepared and presented in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP), we use the following non-GAAP financial measures: non-GAAP gross profit; non-GAAP gross profit margin; non-GAAP operating income; non-GAAP operating profit; non-GAAP operating margin; non-GAAP SG&A expense; non-GAAP profit before tax; non-GAAP tax rate; non-GAAP net income and non-GAAP diluted earnings per share. These non-GAAP measures exclude costs related to restructuring actions, acquisition and related integration expenses, amortization of acquired intangible assets and other non-operational costs.
We also may refer to organic revenue growth or decline and free cash flow, which are also non-GAAP financial measures. We define the term organic revenue as GAAP revenue excluding the effect of changes in foreign currency translation rates and the effect of acquisitions and divestitures, and believe it is a useful measure to evaluate our continuing business. We define free cash flow as net cash provided by operating activities less additions to property, plant, and equipment. We believe free cash flow is a useful measure to evaluate our business because it indicates the amount of cash generated after additions to property, plant, and equipment that is available for, among other things, acquisitions, investments in our business, repayment of debt and return of capital to shareholders.
The presentation of these non-GAAP financial measures is not intended to be a substitute for, or superior to, the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP and may be different from non-GAAP financial measures used by other companies, and therefore, may not be comparable among companies. We believe these non-GAAP financial measures provide meaningful supplemental information regarding our performance. However, we urge investors to review the reconciliation of these financial measures to the comparable GAAP financial measures included in the accompanying tables, and not to rely on any single financial measure to evaluate our business. Specifically, management believes that the non-GAAP measures mentioned above provide relevant and useful information which is widely used by analysts, investors and competitors in our industry, as well as by our management, in assessing both consolidated and business unit performance.
We use these non-GAAP financial measures to evaluate our period-over-period operating performance because our management believes this provides a more comparable measure of our continuing business by adjusting for certain items that are not reflective of the underlying performance of our business. These measures may also be useful to investors in evaluating the underlying operating performance of our business and forecasting future results. We regularly use these non-GAAP financial measures internally to understand, manage, and evaluate our business results and make operating decisions. We also measure our employees and compensate them, in part, based on certain non-GAAP measures and use this information for our planning and forecasting activities.
Additional information relating to the non-GAAP financial measures used in this press release and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are provided in the tables accompanying this press release following our GAAP financial statements.
With respect to our outlook for 2021 non-GAAP operating margin, non-GAAP EPS and non-GAAP tax rate, we are not providing the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures or corresponding reconciliations to such GAAP financial measures on a forward-looking basis, because we are unable to predict with reasonable certainty certain items that may affect such measures calculated and presented in accordance with GAAP without unreasonable effort. Our expected non-GAAP operating margin, tax rate and EPS ranges exclude primarily the future impact of restructuring actions, unusual gains and losses, acquisition-related expenses and purchase accounting fair value adjustments. These reconciling items are uncertain, depend on various factors outside our management’s control and could significantly impact, either individually or in the aggregate, our future period operating margins, EPS and tax rate calculated and presented in accordance with GAAP.