BRIGHT HORIZONS FAMILY SOLUTIONS INC. (BFAM) Business

Item 1. Business

Our Company

For 40 years, Bright Horizons has been a champion for working families — designing and delivering innovative education and care solutions. We are a leading provider of high-quality early education and child care, comprehensive back-up care solutions and educational advisory services. Our offerings support both working families and employers’ workforce strategies by supporting their employees across life and career stages, and improving employee recruitment, engagement, productivity, retention, and career advancement.

We provide services primarily under multi-year contracts with employer-clients who offer early education and child care, back-up care, and educational advisory services as part of their employee benefits package. We are committed to providing the highest quality education and care across all of our offerings, underpinned by rigorous quality standards, research-informed practices and a focus on measurable outcomes for families and employers.

We are organized in three reportable segments, which are aligned with our service offerings as follows:

•Full service center-based child care (71% of our revenue in 2025);

•Back-up care (25% of our revenue in 2025); and

•Educational advisory services (4% of our revenue in 2025).

As of December 31, 2025, we served more than 1,450 employers across a diverse array of industries, including more than 220 Fortune 500 companies. As of December 31, 2025, we operated 1,010 early education and child care centers with the capacity to serve approximately 115,000 children in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia, and India.

Our History

Guided by our HEART principles — Honesty, Excellence, Accountability, Respect, and Teamwork — we have operated early education and child care centers for employers and working families since 1986. In 1998, we transformed our organization through the merger of Bright Horizons, Inc. and Corporate Family Solutions, Inc., both then Nasdaq-listed companies founded in 1986 and 1987, respectively. We were listed on Nasdaq from 1998 to May 2008 when we were acquired and went private. On January 30, 2013, we completed our initial public offering and our common stock became listed on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) under the symbol “BFAM.”

Throughout our history, we have continued to grow while investing strategically in technology, quality and service expansion and innovation. We have extended our international footprint to become a leading provider in the center-based child care and back-up care market in the United Kingdom and have expanded child care operations into the Netherlands, Australia, and India. In the United States, we continue to deepen our partnerships with employer clients by supporting their development of child care centers, expanding and enhancing our suite of back-up care offerings, and by growing our educational advisory services. We continue to innovate and invest in leading technology to support our full suite of services as well as enhance our customers’ user experience, with a focus on driving utilization of our services and maximizing enrollment and engagement across all offerings.

Industry Overview and Trends

We compete in the global market for early education and child care services as well as the growing markets for back-up care solutions and workforce education services offered by employers as benefits to their employees.

The child care industry generally can be divided into center-based and home-based child care. Our full service segment operates in the center-based market, which is highly fragmented, and includes both retail and employer-sponsored centers. The employer-sponsored model, in which a single employer or consortium of employers enters into a long-term contract for the provision of care at or near the employer’s worksite, has long been central to our business. We believe we are one of the largest high-quality providers of employer-sponsored child care.

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We also operate in the growing market for back-up and dependent care, which includes center-based back-up care and in-home care, school-age programs (including camps and tutoring), senior care and pet care. These services are designed to support an employer’s workforce by providing care coverage when primary arrangements are unavailable or insufficient. We believe such coverage directly supports employee productivity and engagement.

Additionally, we operate in the educational advisory services market, which consists of workforce education, tuition assistance, student loan repayment, and college admissions and financing advisory services. These solutions are designed to help employees upskill and advance their careers, assist employers in developing strategic workforce talent and enable working families to achieve their higher education goals. We believe we are one of the largest high-quality providers in each of these markets.

We believe that the following key factors contribute to growth in the markets for center-based and employer-sponsored child care, back-up care, and educational advisory services. Although healthcare and financial benefits are standard components of employee compensation, the inclusion of education and care benefits reflects a more comprehensive investment in human capital and elevates an employer’s credibility and differentiation.

Care and Education as Critical Workforce Benefits

Employers increasingly view child care, back-up care and education benefits as key offerings that improve employee productivity, recruitment, retention, and engagement. We believe workforce engagement challenges are widespread across industries and we offer a suite of solutions to help employers solve these challenges, which enable the employers to deliver on their own business priorities. In response to a 2025 internal survey, approximately 90% of our parents reported that our child care services enabled them to fulfill their work obligations and increased their commitment to their employer. According to our 2025 Modern Family Index, 78% of working parents report that the reliability of their child care has a direct impact on their career success. We believe our suite of services can play a critical role helping employers attract, retain and engage talent.

Participation of Parents in the Workforce

A significant share of the labor force consists of working parents, increasing the stakes for both families and employers to ensure access to reliable care solutions. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, women working full-time accounted for approximately 50% of the labor force in 2024, and the labor force participation rate of mothers with children under the age of six was approximately 68%. In addition, both spouses were employed in approximately half of married couples in the U.S., reflecting the prevalence of dual-income households and the need for stable and available care arrangements to support working families. Such workforce participation patterns reinforce the importance of employer-sponsored care solutions to support recruitment, retention and engagement objectives and enable working parents to meet job requirements and commitments.

Increasing Need for Flexible and Comprehensive Care and Education Solutions

Work environments and employee needs have become more variable in recent years, increasing demand for care solutions that support a broad range of family situations, workforce demographics and life stages. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, nearly 25% of the workforce worked remotely in 2024, creating greater variability in how, where and when work is performed. We believe these trends are driving demand for a comprehensive suite of care solutions that provide flexibility for both the employer and employee. In this environment, we believe employers and families increasingly value scaled, national providers with breadth, reliability and infrastructure to deliver consistent support across locations, service types and employee life stages.

Additionally, due to the evolution of new technologies, as well as increased competition for talent, employers are focused on the upskilling and reskilling needs of their workforces. We believe that the modern worker values investments by their employer that help them thrive in the workplace across career stages, as well as advance their careers through access to degree and non-degree education programs.

Demand for High-Quality Early Care and Education Environments

Parents place a high priority on quality, safety, teacher-child relationships, and developmental rigor in early education and care environments, reflecting the importance of early childhood as a foundational period for cognitive, social and emotional, linguistic, and physical development. According to a 2024 working paper from the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, early childhood is the period during which important components of brain architecture are developed, and early experiences play a critical role in shaping long-term developmental outcomes. As a result of increasing awareness of the lifelong impact of early childhood experiences, we believe families increasingly seek providers that demonstrate consistent quality standards, ensure comprehensive training for educators, offer age-appropriate curriculum and ensure safe environments. We believe this emphasis on quality outcomes support demand by both parents and employers for trusted providers capable of delivering reliable, high-quality care at scale.

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Our Competitive Strengths

We believe we are a provider, partner and employer of choice because of our dedication to developing and delivering high-quality solutions to those we serve.

Workforce Solutions Embedded in Employer Relationships

Over the last 40 years, we have built long-standing, deeply embedded relationships with employers by delivering care and education solutions that support workforce recruitment, engagement, productivity, retention, and career advancement. We serve more than 1,450 employers, including more than 220 Fortune 500 companies, across a broad range of industries and geographies. Our largest client represented approximately 1% of our revenue in 2025, and our 10 largest clients represented approximately 8% of our revenue in the same year, reflecting a highly diversified client base.

Our employer-first model is characterized by long-term contracts, collaborative service delivery and shared commitment to supporting employees and their families. Our ability to deliver a broad suite of services - full service center-based child care, back-up care, and educational advisory services - enables employers to address multiple workforce needs through a single, integrated and trusted partner. We believe this breadth of services positions us as a strategic partner and creates meaningful client switching costs, as reflected by our approximately 95% client retention rate over the past 10 years.

Scaled, Capital-Efficient Provider with a Diversified Portfolio of Services

We are one of the largest service providers for employer-sponsored child care and back-up care solutions, operating across five countries, with more than 1,000 centers and the capacity to serve approximately 115,000 children. Based on our internal analysis, we believe we operate approximately six times more employer-sponsored child care centers than our nearest competitor, and that our back-up care operations are approximately four times larger than the next largest provider. Our scale allows us to serve large, multi-location employers while maintaining localized service delivery.

Our business model is capital efficient. Employer sponsors typically fund a significant portion of new center development and absorb a meaningful share of ongoing operating costs, while our back-up care offerings leverage a combination of owned centers and third-party provider networks. This structure supports capital efficient growth and attractive economics.

Comprehensive, Flexible Solutions Address the Full Spectrum of Care and Education Needs

We believe our ability to deliver a comprehensive suite of care and education solutions creates a distinct, competitive advantage for our clients who operate in an environment where employee needs vary by location, work schedule and life stage. Our offerings include full-time center-based care near the workplace or home, in-home and center-based back-up care, school-age and seasonal programs, and educational coaching, tutoring and advisory services.

Our breadth of services allows employers to support employees across a wide range of life and career stages, including ongoing care needs, school breaks, and unplanned disruptions, while our infrastructure and integrated technology platforms support reliable service delivery and a consistent experience for employers and families. Further, as employers compete for top talent in an environment shaped by rapid digital and AI-driven change, our educational advisory services can help employers keep pace with shifting workforce demands for upskilling and reskilling and meet their strategic workforce goals.

Trusted Provider of High-Quality Early Education and Care

Quality is the foundation of our value proposition. We have invested for decades in research-based curriculum, educator training, and program evaluation designed to deliver consistent, high-quality early education and care outcomes. Our centers are designed to meet rigorous accreditation and rating standards established by leading organizations such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children in the United States, by the Office of Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (OFSTED) in the United Kingdom, and by the Education Council and Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA) in Australia.

Our commitment to quality is supported by a sustained focus on learning and development. Our curriculum and teacher training programs are designed to support inclusive classrooms, positive learning environments and are informed by research on early learning and childhood development. We provide tools and training that help our staff and educators translate research into practice through learning experiences and evidence-based instructional practices. Additionally, to ensure our education programs reflect both time-tested developmental theories and contemporary evidence-based research, we have an Educational Advisory Network of academics, scholars, and early education organization leaders. We also believe that low teacher-to-child ratios and small group sizes, which meet or exceed licensing standards, are important to delivering consistent educational outcomes and enabling more personalized care to the families we serve.

Our standards of quality extend beyond our full service centers to our back-up care and in-home care networks, where we apply defined quality criteria and oversight standards. We believe our reputation as a trusted provider enables employers and families to rely on our services during critical moments, reinforcing long-term relationships and recurring utilization.

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Market Leading People Practices

Our ability to deliver high-quality care, education and other services is enabled by our ability to attract, retain, motivate and develop skilled talent. Over our 40 year history, we have been consistently recognized as a top employer by third-party sources, including Fortune magazine, the Great Place to Work Institute, industry publications and the Boston Globe and the Denver Post, reflecting our investments in people, training, and workplace culture and practices.

We believe the education and experience of our child care center leaders and teachers exceed the industry averages, supported by comprehensive onboarding, ongoing in-center training, and access to an in-house online training university, offering nationally recognized child development credentials. In addition, our innovative Horizons CDA and Degree Program fully funds U.S.-based educators in earning their child development associate certification or post-secondary degrees in early childhood education, reinforcing our standing as an employer of choice, while helping to retain and incentivize teachers to grow their careers at Bright Horizons.

Data, Technology and Operating Discipline at Scale

We have made sustained investments in technology, data analytics and centralized operating infrastructure to support our multi-service offerings. Our systems provide visibility into utilization, enrollment, staffing and performance metrics across our operations, allowing us to evaluate and allocate resources effectively and respond to changing demand patterns. Our digital tools support a seamless experience for families and employers, while our operating discipline allows us to apply best practices consistently across our network. We believe this combination of data, technology and scale strengthens service delivery, enhances economics and supports sustainable growth.

Experienced Management Team with Deep Industry and Operating Expertise

Our management team brings decades of experience in early education, employer-sponsored care solutions and operating and scaling large organizations. This experience has enabled us to effectively navigate multiple economic cycles, numerous regulatory environments and shifts in workforce dynamics while maintaining focus on long-term value creation. We believe our leadership team’s understanding of both the operational complexity and the strategic priorities of employers positions us to effectively address evolving needs and allocate capital and resources with discipline.

Our Growth Strategy

We believe there are significant opportunities to continue to grow our business globally by executing on the following strategies.

Expand and Deepen Employer Relationships

We believe there is a substantial opportunity to expand our client base and continue to deepen existing employer relationships across our services. For our full service center-based child care business, we primarily target large employers with sufficient employee concentration to support employer-sponsored centers. Our addressable market includes approximately 13,500 employers, each with at least 1,000 employees, within the industries that we currently serve in the U.S. and U.K. For our back-up care and educational advisory services, our addressable market is broader because these offerings do not require an on-site physical infrastructure, upfront capital investment or a critical mass of employees at a single worksite. As a result, these services are marketable across a wider range of employer sizes, industries and workforce demographics. Based on the most recent data available from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Statistics of U.S. Businesses in 2022, there were approximately 21,000 U.S. businesses with 500 or more employees, representing a large population of potential clients for our back-up care and educational advisory services.

As of December 31, 2025, we served more than 1,450 employers, with approximately one-third of clients purchasing more than one service. We believe continued new client acquisition and increased cross-service adoption and service expansion within existing employer relationships also will remain important drivers of growth.

Drive Utilization Across Our Portfolio

A central element of our growth strategy is increasing utilization of our services among eligible employees and families. Across our portfolio, utilization rates among employees who have access to our services remain relatively low, reflecting opportunities to increase awareness, engagement and ease of access across a broad range of recurring and intermittent care and education needs. We focus on driving deeper utilization within existing employer relationships by expanding employee awareness, simplifying access through our digital platforms, introducing new eligible care types and solutions, and encouraging use of multiple services. We are enhancing our capabilities by gaining a more comprehensive understanding of the care services utilized by our consumers, enabling us to proactively deliver appropriate services, anticipate consumer needs, and evolve our offerings in response to changing demand. Increased utilization supports revenue growth and operating leverage and allows us to serve a larger share of employee needs within each client relationship without a corresponding increase in capital investment.

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Maintain a Capital-Efficient Operating Model

Our growth strategy is governed by a disciplined, capital-efficient operating model. In our full service center-based child care business, employer sponsors typically contribute to the development and ongoing operation of child care centers through operating subsidies, helping to mitigate development, capital and occupancy risk. This employer-sponsored model, which largely exists in the U.S. and U.K., allows us to expand our footprint while maintaining a disciplined approach to capital deployment.

In our back-up care offerings, we leverage a network of more than 5,500 providers, combining Bright Horizons owned capacity through our back-up care operations and full service center network along with third-party providers. This hybrid model enables us to expand both capacity and geographic reach with limited capital investment while maintaining service reliability and quality standards consistent across markets.

Disciplined Expansion of Full Service Center-Based Child Care

Full service child care remains an important foundation of our business and a key element of our employer value proposition. We pursue disciplined growth by focusing on improving enrollment and utilization in our existing center portfolio, partnering with employers to build new centers or assuming management of existing employer-sponsored centers, and selectively adding new lease consortium centers where employer concentration and market demographics align with our return objectives. We regularly review our center portfolio to ensure alignment with client needs, market demand from families needing care, and demographics. In addition to rationalizing the existing portfolio to exit locations which no longer meet our growth and return profile, we also apply a consistent framework to new center development and acquisitions with a focus on long-term performance and capital discipline.

Our Operations

Our services are designed to help families, employers, and their employees solve the challenges of the modern workforce across life and career stages. Our services are comprised of full service center-based child care, back-up care, and educational advisory services, which are also our reportable segments. Full service center-based child care includes traditional center-based early education and child care, preschool, and elementary education. Back-up care includes center-based back-up child care, in-home care for children and seniors, school-age programs (including camps and tutoring), pet care, self-sourced reimbursed care, and Sittercity, an online marketplace for families and caregivers. Educational advisory services consist of tuition assistance and student loan repayment program management, workforce education, related educational advising, and college admissions counseling services. The following table sets forth our segment results for the year ended December 31, 2025:

Additional segment information is included in Note 17, Segment and Geographic Information, to the consolidated financial statements in Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

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Full Service Center-Based Child Care Services

We provide full service center-based child care at centers located at or near an employer sponsor’s worksite, as well as convenient locations within the community. We operate our centers under two principal business models: a profit and loss (“P&L”) model and a cost-plus model.

Profit and Loss Model: Approximately 75% of our centers operate under the P&L model. Under this model, we retain the financial outcomes of operating the center and are therefore subject to variability in financial performance due to fluctuations in enrollment levels. The P&L model is further classified into two subcategories:

•Sponsor model: Under the sponsor model, we provide early education and child care on an exclusive or priority enrollment basis for the employees of an employer sponsor, and the employer sponsor generally retains responsibility for the development of the child care center (which is owned or leased by the sponsor), as well as pre-opening capital equipment and ongoing maintenance and repair. Arrangements with employer sponsors generally have initial terms ranging from 3 to 10 years with varying terms, renewal and termination options.

•Lease model: Under the lease model, the child care center is typically located near where working parents live and/or work in a property that we lease, and we provide early education and child care services to the employees of multiple employers, as well as to families in the surrounding community. We typically enter into leases with initial terms ranging from 10 to 15 years for these centers, often with renewal options.

When we open a new P&L center, it generally takes two to three years for the center to ramp up to a steady state level of enrollment, as a center will typically enroll younger children at the outset with children aging into the older (preschool) classrooms over time. We refer to centers that have been open for three years or less as “ramping centers.” A P&L center will typically achieve breakeven operating performance between 12 to 24 months and will typically achieve a steady state level of enrollment that supports our average center operating profit by the end of three years, although the time period needed to reach a steady state level of enrollment may be longer or shorter. Centers that have been open more than three years are referred to as “mature centers.”

Cost-Plus Model: Approximately 25% of our centers operate under the cost-plus business model. Under this model, we receive a fee from the employer sponsor for managing and operating their center. Additionally, employer sponsors typically provide operating subsidies to support the ongoing provision of child care services to their employees if center operating costs exceed revenue from tuition paid by parents. The employer sponsor typically retains responsibility for the development of the child care center (which is owned or leased by the sponsor), as well as pre-opening capital equipment and ongoing maintenance and repair, and the center is profitable from the outset. Our cost-plus contracts typically have initial terms ranging from three to five years with varying terms, renewal and termination options. Under the cost-plus model, the employer sponsor bears the financial risk for operating the center.

Under all model types, we retain responsibility for all aspects of operating the child care center, including hiring and paying employees, ongoing training, curriculum, contracting with vendors, purchasing supplies, and collecting tuition.

Tuition paid by families represents approximately 90% of the revenue generated by this segment and is determined based on the age and developmental level of the child, the child’s attendance schedule (full-time or part-time), the geographic location, and the extent to which an employer sponsor subsidizes tuition. Based on a sample of approximately 350 of our early education and child care centers in the United States, the current average tuition at our centers is $2,765 per month for infants (typically ages 3 to 16 months), $2,565 per month for toddlers (typically ages 16 months to 3 years) and $2,175 per month for preschoolers (typically ages 3 to 5 years). Tuition at most of our early education and child care centers is payable in advance and is typically due monthly.

Annual revenue for mature centers typically averages between $1.8 million and $2.8 million at our centers, which is primarily driven by the size and capacity of centers. Gross margins at our mature centers typically average between 20% and 25%, with our cost-plus model centers typically at the lower end of that range and our lease model centers at the higher end.

Cost of services consists of direct expenses associated with the operation of early education and child care centers and is primarily comprised of personnel salaries and benefits, food costs, program supplies and materials, parent marketing, and facilities costs, which include occupancy costs and depreciation. Personnel costs are the largest component of a center’s operating costs and typically comprise approximately 70% of a center’s operating expenses. Personnel costs in centers operating under P&L models will often represent a lower percentage of overall costs when compared to centers operating under cost-plus models as we are often responsible for additional other costs that are typically paid or provided directly by an employer sponsor in centers operating under the cost-plus model.

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Selling, general and administrative expenses (“SGA”) relating to full service center-based child care consist primarily of salaries and benefits (including stock-based compensation costs) for non-center personnel, which includes corporate, regional and business development personnel; accounting, legal and management/advisory fees; information technology; occupancy costs for corporate and regional personnel; and other general corporate expenses.

Back-up Care Services

Back-up care offers family support services for dependents of all ages and provides coverage when regular or other previously planned care breaks down, as well as care coordination tools to assist families with their short and long-term care needs. We provide back-up care services for children (primarily 0-12 years old) through our own full service child care centers, dedicated back-up child care centers, school-age programs (including camps), and in-home caregivers, as well as through our proprietary back-up care network of quality third party child care centers, camps and in-home care providers. We provide back-up care services for seniors through our proprietary network of quality in-home care providers and adult center-based care, tutoring for school-age children and adult learners through our network of tutoring service providers, pet care through third-party providers, and also help to facilitate back-up care services through our self-sourced reimbursed care program. We also own and operate Sittercity, an online marketplace that helps families and caregivers find child care (child care providers, babysitting/nannies) and pet care services.

Back-up care offers families access to a contracted network of more than 5,500 providers, combining Bright Horizons owned capacity through our back-up care operations and full service center network with third-party providers. Our dedicated back-up centers are operated in a similar structure to full service centers and are either exclusive to a single employer or have multiple employer sponsors. Self-sourced reimbursed care is an alternative care program, available to employer sponsors typically when other network care solutions are not available, which provides payments to their employees to assist with the cost of self-sourced dependent care. Back-up care solutions include broader school-age programs, such as camps and tutoring, with camps primarily operating during school vacations and the summer months, and a network of in-home caregivers for senior care. Back-up care requests are arranged online or via our mobile app as well as through a 24/7 contact center, allowing users to reserve care in advance or at the last minute. We operate our own contact center and we contract with additional contact centers in other geographies to complement our ability to handle demand fluctuations, provide business continuity, and deliver seamless service across time zones.

Back-up care revenue is comprised of fees paid by employer sponsors and, to a lesser extent, co-payments collected from users at the time of service. These arrangements generally have contractual terms of three years with varying terms, renewal and termination options. Fees for back-up care services are typically determined based on the number of back-up care uses purchased and may be fixed for a specified number of contracted uses or variable for pay-per-use contracts. Cost of services consists of direct expenses associated with the operation of child care centers, fees paid to providers for care delivered as part of their contractual relationships with us, personnel and related direct service costs of the contact centers, and any other expenses related to the coordination or delivery of care and service. The nature of SGA related to back-up care is similar to SGA for full service center-based child care, with additional expenses related to the technology necessary to operate this service, the ongoing development and maintenance of the provider network, and additional personnel needed as a result of more significant client management and reporting requirements.

Educational Advisory Services

Our educational advisory services consist of EdAssist and College Coach. Educational advisory services revenue is comprised of fees paid by employer clients for policy consulting, program management, coaching, subscription content and, to a limited extent, retail fees collected from users at the point of service. Contracts are typically three years in length, with varying terms, renewal and termination options, and fees are generally determined based on the services being provided and the number of program participants. Cost of services consists of personnel and direct operating costs of the contact centers and other expenses related to the coordination and delivery of tuition assistance, student loan repayment program management, and educational advisory services. The nature of SGA related to educational advisory services is similar to SGA for back-up care.

EdAssist.  EdAssist provides workforce education, tuition assistance and student loan repayment program management, as well as related educational advising to corporate clients who offer these services as a talent development and workplace benefit to their employees. Our services help employers better align their workplace education programs with their business goals while supporting employees to upskill, reskill and improve their careers. Program management services are provided through proprietary software for the processing of tuition reimbursement, loan repayment transactions, and analysis of data. We provide educational advising to our clients’ employees on a one-on-one basis through our team of advisors who help users make informed decisions regarding their education and financial wellness. Clients can also leverage our EdAssist Education Network of education providers and benefit from pre-negotiated tuition discounts. EdAssist services derive revenue directly from fees paid by employers.

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College Coach.  College Coach provides college admissions and college financing advisory services through our team of experts, who have experience working in admissions or financial aid at colleges and universities. We also offer coaching and tools to assist families as they support their children with varying needs across life stages, such as navigating middle school and saving for college. Advisory services are delivered via live/webinar events with expert presenters, through one-on-one coaching, and through our online learning center. We work with employer clients who offer these services as workplace benefits to their employees, and we also provide these services directly to families on a retail basis. College Coach derives revenue mainly from employer clients who contract with us for a specified number of workshops, access to our proprietary online learning center, and one-on-one advising.

Geography

We operate in two primary regions: (1) North America, which includes our operations in the United States (including Puerto Rico), and (2) Outside North America, which includes our operations in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia and India. The following table sets forth information by geographic region for the year ended December 31, 2025:

Our business outside North America primarily consists of child care centers throughout the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Australia, with 92% of the revenue generated related to the full service center-based child care segment, with the remaining 8% relating to back-up care in the U.K. As of December 31, 2025, we had 597 centers in North America and 413 centers outside North America. Additional geographical information is included in Note 17, Segment and Geographic Information, to the consolidated financial statements in Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Seasonality

Historically, our full service center-based child care and back-up care operations are subject to seasonal and quarterly fluctuations, which can vary by geography. Demand for early education and child care services has historically decreased during the summer months when school is not in session and families are often on vacation or have alternative child care arrangements. In addition, enrollment at our child care centers declines as older children transition to elementary schools in the summer and fall months. Demand for our services generally increases with the beginning of the new school year and remains relatively stable throughout the rest of the school year. Use of our back-up care services tends to be higher when schools are not in session and during holiday periods, which can increase the operating costs of the program and impact the results of operations. Educational advisory services generally have limited seasonal fluctuations.

Results of operations may also fluctuate from quarter to quarter as a result of, among other things, the performance of existing centers, including enrollment and staffing fluctuations, the number and timing of new center openings, additions from acquisitions and center management transitions, the timing of new client launches in our back-up care and educational advisory services, the length of time required for new centers to achieve profitability, center closings, the contract model mix (P&L versus cost-plus) of new and existing centers, the level of sponsorship payments, and general economic conditions.

Marketing

Brand Awareness and Thought Leadership

Our brand and reputation for quality strengthens our ability to attract and retain clients, families and employees. We market our services and build our brand through events, social media, earned and paid media placements, digital and print advertising, articles and blogs, direct mail, and a robust search engine optimization strategy. Our senior leaders are involved at the national level with education, work/life and early child care advocacy, and we believe that their visibility and involvement helps attract new business. We conduct our annual Modern Family Index and The Education Index, capturing snapshots of sentiments of critical market sectors at a particular moment in time. We believe that our proprietary research, events, and the availability of uniquely knowledgeable industry leaders help sustain our brand awareness and position Bright Horizons as a thought leader in the markets where we operate.

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Timely Approaches that Evolve with the Workplace

We strive to meet clients’ needs as demonstrated by our capacity to pivot as the marketplace shifts, rolling out and marketing new services to meet evolving work environments. Marketing tools have expanded to include personalized communications based on specific, known care needs and availability; targeted back-up journeys and campaigns; outreach for flexible care offerings including options such as tutoring and camps; and sharing our curriculum and extension activities with families at home through our online platforms. Outreach for these efforts includes campaigns for back-to-school and return-to-office support, initiatives aimed at supporting enrolled families including age-based developmental notifications through our parent mobile app, a monthly parenting and client employee newsletter, podcasts and a parenting exchange workshop series.

Lead Generation and Conversion; Customer Retention

Lead generation and conversion, increased utilization of our service offerings, and customer retention remain at the heart of our marketing efforts. We partner with employer sponsors to promote our early education and child care centers and other workplace solutions as important employee benefits within their organizations. My Bright Horizons is a portal for our clients’ employees to instantly access their Bright Horizons benefits, and BH Central is a self-service portal for client liaisons to track real-time benefit use and access materials to support internal marketing efforts, including a newsletter with tailored resource content. Other efforts include local digital advertising, partnerships with parent groups, social efforts, direct mail, and webinars.

Competition

We believe we are a leading provider of employer-sponsored center-based child care, back-up care, and workforce education services. The market for early education and child care services is highly fragmented, and we compete for enrollment and sponsorship of early education and child care centers with a variety of other organizations, including large community-based child care companies, regional child care providers, family day care, nannies, for-profit and not-for-profit full- and part-time nursery schools, public and private elementary schools, and not-for-profit and government-funded providers of center-based child care. Our principal competitors for employer-sponsored centers include KinderCare Education in the United States and Busy Bees in the United Kingdom. We also compete for enrollment on a center-by-center basis with these providers, along with many local and national providers, such as Affinity Education Group, CompaNanny, G8 Education, Goddard Schools, Goodstart Early Learning, Guardian Childcare & Education, KidsFoundation, Kids Planet, Learning Care Group, Partou, and Primrose Schools. Competition for back-up care comes from IAC/Interactivecorp (Care.com) in addition to employee assistance programs and smaller work/life companies in the market. In the educational advisory services segment competition comes from EdCor, Guild Education, InStride, and Tuition.io as well as other existing smaller providers in the market.

We believe the key factors in the competition for full service center enrollment are quality of care, site convenience and cost. We believe many center-based child care providers are able to offer care at lower prices than we do by utilizing less intensive teacher-to-child ratios and offering lower compensation and benefits to their employees. While our child care tuition levels are generally higher than many of our competitors, we compete primarily based on the convenience of a location at or near a worksite and a higher level of program quality. Some of our competitors may benefit from strong local name recognition or comply, or are required to comply, with fewer or less costly health, safety, and operational regulations than those with which we comply (such as the more limited health, safety and operational regulatory requirements typically applicable to family day care operations in caregivers’ homes). We believe that our primary focus on serving employer clients, underscored by our track record for achieving and maintaining high-quality standards, distinguishes us from our competitors.

Human Capital Management

Education and care can change lives, and for 40 years Bright Horizons has been changing the way families live and work. To achieve this mission and to deliver results, we put our HEART principles at the forefront of everything we do. Our HEART principles — Honesty, Excellence, Accountability, Respect, and Teamwork — are the underlying tenets of our culture and are guided by the core belief that our people are the foundation to building and sustaining an organization that makes a significant impact in the lives of the children, families and adult learners we serve.

As of December 31, 2025, we had approximately 32,200 global employees (including part-time and substitute teachers), of whom approximately 3,300 were employed as corporate, divisional and regional employees, and approximately 28,900 were employed at our early education and child care centers and as in-home caregivers. The total number of employees includes approximately 18,450 in North America, 9,250 in the United Kingdom, 2,400 in the Netherlands, 2,050 in Australia, and 50 in India. Corporate, divisional and regional staff members make up our “Home Team” employees, and staff members working at our early education and child care centers, including teachers and support personnel, and in-home caregivers make up our “Field” employees. Currently, there are no active labor unions.

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Our People Practices

More than 1,450 leading employers trust us for proven solutions that support employees, advance careers, and maximize employee performance, and we offer our own employees the solutions and services we offer to our clients. From on-site child care, to back-up care that addresses gaps in child care, to education programs that build critical skills, we believe our service offerings help our employees achieve more.

Our business is about people serving people, and our success depends on attracting, developing and retaining talented and highly qualified employees. Our employee value proposition – You’re the Difference – is our pledge to providing market-leading benefits and rewards, opportunities for advancement and career growth, and a strong culture to celebrate our shared mission and values. We are continually investing in resources and creating programs to build culture, to provide fair and competitive pay, to offer benefits to support our employees’ well-being, and to foster personal growth and career development opportunities. We endeavor to create environments that attract, retain and engage our talent, enhance our culture and employee experience, and reward performance.

Talent Acquisition and Total Rewards

We deploy proven solutions that recruit talent, support employees, advance careers, and maximize employee performance. Through ongoing initiatives such as our 100 Days of Heart onboarding program, our employee referral program, our alumni recruitment portal, and partnerships with high schools, colleges and universities, Bright Horizons and our dedicated talent acquisition team help address the challenges in attracting top talent in our field.

We offer a comprehensive total rewards program aimed at addressing the varying health, financial and well-being needs of our employees. Our total rewards package, which may vary by geography, employee, and eligibility requirements, includes:

•Competitive pay and healthcare benefits;

•401(k) retirement plans with matching contributions;

•Paid time off;

•Wellness initiatives with benefits relating to nutrition, stress management and financial well-being, mental health, work-life balance and an Employee Assistance Program;

•Child care tuition subsidies for both Field and Home Team employees;

•Tuition assistance programs, including the Horizons CDA and Degree Program which provides direct, no-cost access to an early childhood education degree;

•Access to back-up care, EdAssist, College Coach and Sittercity; and,

•Paid parental bonding leave.

Career Development and our Horizons CDA and Degree Program

We invest in our employees’ career growth. Employee training and development opportunities are critical to our success as they help develop leaders within our organization and support the delivery of quality services to our clients, and the families and learners we serve. We provide a robust, ongoing employee training and career development program that is available to employees through our online training university. Our blended learning approach means employees have a selection of different learning methods available to them, including live interactive online webinars, in person training, eLearning modules, and videos. We are also invested in long-term employee success and are committed to advancing talent from within by developing the next generation of leaders at Bright Horizons. By creating clear pathways for career development, through leadership training and development, we support and encourage upward career mobility in both our Field operations and throughout our Home Team.

A central program offering is our Horizons CDA and Degree Program. The program, which is a first-of-its-kind offering in the early education field, removes financial barriers for employees interested in furthering their education by allowing employees to earn a CDA (“child development associate”) certificate or an associate’s or bachelor’s degree in early childhood education at no-cost and with no out-of-pocket expenses, including tuition, fees and books. Since 2018, more than 8,000 educators have enrolled in the Horizons CDA and Degree Program, with nearly 3,000 educators earning their CDA credential or college degree. We have recently expanded the program to offer an early care and education graduate certificate for center leaders and an English Language Learning (ELL) program for all educators.

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Employee Engagement

At Bright Horizons gathering continuous feedback is an essential part of our culture. We regularly collect feedback from our employees through our annual employee experience survey and through other periodic surveys and forums. Hearing directly from our employees helps us understand the employee experience, including evolving priorities related to workplace environment, employee relations, pay and benefits, flexibility, and career growth opportunities, all of which are critical to our mission to remain an employer of choice and a great place to work. We champion a culture of belonging and appreciation through our engagement programs, including Better Together programming and activities that support the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children®.

Better Together

Culture and Inclusion

Bright Horizons is an organization made up of employees, children and families from many cultures, backgrounds and experiences. We believe that fostering a workplace where all employees feel welcome and have a sense of belonging, as well as where everyone's unique differences are celebrated and valued, is vital to the Bright Horizons mission and culture. We look to create open and inclusive environments for all of our employees by listening to our people, utilizing our employee resource groups, which are open to all employees, and deepening cultural awareness through learning opportunities. We believe our approach to building and maintaining a strong culture and inclusive environment helps us recruit and retain talent, reduce turnover, and enhance all of our offerings and service lines as well as the education and services we deliver daily to children and families.

As of December 31, 2025, our workforce composition was approximately as follows:

(1)Represents percentage of women in the workforce.

(2)Non-White is defined as: American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, or two or more races.

(3)Only includes employees that self-identify.

(4)Senior leader is defined as Vice President and equivalent, and above, and includes executive officers.

Community and Citizenship

We support the communities in which we work and live, and we actively encourage our employees to do the same. We proudly stand with our many employees who support the Bright Horizons Employee Relief Fund, which offers financial assistance to employees recovering from catastrophic events, and we proudly support our many employees who give their time to non-profit organizations, awarding grants to their chosen charities through the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children® in recognition of their volunteer work in their communities. We collaborate with our employees to advance the Foundation’s mission of creating Bright Spaces for at-risk children and families in homeless shelters, health care facilities, police stations and other community organizations that serve families in need or in crisis. We do this by supporting our employees’ service projects through Brightening Lives Activity grants and Field and Home Team fundraising events.

Our Award Winning Culture

We are honored and proud to have a long track record of being named an employer of choice. The following awards represent a recognition of the strong culture we have built at Bright Horizons and the programs and benefits we offer to our employees. These honors are awarded based largely on employee responses to surveys.

•2025 “Best Places to Work” by the Boston Business Journal

•2025 America’s Greatest Workplaces for Inclusion & Diversity by Newsweek

•2025 “Best Workplaces” in the United Kingdom by the Great Place to Work Institute

•2025 “Best Workplaces for Women” by the Great Place to Work Institute in the United Kingdom

•2025 “Best Workplaces for Development” by the Great Place to Work Institute in the United Kingdom

•2025 “Best Workplaces for Wellbeing” by the Great Place to Work Institute in the United Kingdom

•2025 “Best Workplaces in Education and Training” by the Great Place to Work Institute in the United Kingdom

•2025 “Best Workplaces for Women” in the Netherlands by the Great Place to Work Institute

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Intellectual Property

We believe our brand, name and logo have significant value to our operations. We own and use various registered and unregistered trademarks covering the names Bright Horizons® and Bright Horizons Family Solutions®, our logo, and a number of other names, slogans and designs in the United States and abroad. We frequently license the use of our registered trademarks to our clients in connection with the use of our services, subject to customary restrictions. We protect our trademarks by registering the marks in a variety of countries and geographic areas, including the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Union, Australia, New Zealand, India, and other countries in Asia. These registrations are subject to varying terms and renewal options. However, not all of the trademarks or service marks have been registered in all of the countries in which we do business, and we are aware of persons using similar marks in certain countries in which we operate. Meanwhile, we monitor our trademarks and vigorously oppose the infringement of any of our registered marks as appropriate. We do not hold any patents. We hold copyright registrations for certain materials that are important to the operation of our business, and we generally rely on common law protection for other copyrighted works. We enter into agreements with our employees and other parties with which we do business to limit access to, and disclosure of, our technology and other proprietary information. We also license some intellectual property from third parties for use in our business and such licenses are not individually or in the aggregate material to our business.

Regulatory Matters

Our business operates in multiple jurisdictions, and we are subject to various national and regional laws, rules and regulations, including labor, licensing, health, fire and safety, and data privacy requirements and standards. Some of the laws and regulations that govern our operations include but are not limited to:

•consumer protection laws;

•labor and employment laws, including wage and hour laws;

•licensing and child care specific regulations;

•tax laws or interpretations thereof;

•data protection, privacy and security laws and regulations; and,

•environmental, building and fire code, public health, and safety laws and regulations.

The following discussion highlights our key areas of focus. For a discussion of the risks associated with the laws and regulations that may materially impact us, please see the section entitled “Risk Factors” in Item 1A of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.

Child Care Center Licensing

The laws and regulations relating to the provision of child care vary between jurisdictions and are numerous and complex. In most jurisdictions where we operate, our child care centers are required by law to meet a variety of operational requirements, including minimum qualifications and background checks for our center personnel as well as teacher-to-child ratios and various labor, licensing, and health, fire and safety regulations. In the U.S., the licensing and operation of child care centers are regulated at the state and local level. In the U.K., we are regulated by OFSTED in England and the Care Inspectorate in Scotland. In the Netherlands, child care center licenses are issued by the National Childcare Register (Landelijk Register Kinderopvang) and centers are regulated by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment with inspections carried out by the GGD (Municipal Health Service). Australia is regulated by the ACECQA and, in India, centers fall under local municipalities and state government licensing bodies. We believe that our centers and operations comply in all material respects with all applicable laws and regulations.

Safeguarding Practices

The safety and well-being of children and staff is our top priority and our most important responsibility. Safeguarding begins with hiring and screening practices, including background checks that meet or exceed regulatory requirements and reference checks. Our onboarding programs include mandatory training for all center staff during their first 100 days and continued training throughout their employment on safeguarding practices, including positive guidance and mandated reporting. Our early education and child care centers are guided by extensive safeguarding policies and procedures that establish protocols for the safe and appropriate care of children, including infant/child first aid and CPR, safe sleep practice and other critical aspects of care to ensure that centers meet or exceed all mandated licensing standards. These policies and procedures are reviewed and updated regularly by a team of internal experts to incorporate best practices and learnings from our operations. Self-reporting is a core principle of our operations and our “see/sense something, say something” approach encourages staff to report any concerns. We further augment our safeguarding practices with classroom observations, including unannounced visits, as well as regular quality and health and safety audits and we maintain an open-door policy for any family who would like to visit their child’s classroom or speak to center leadership. In the U.S., our proprietary We Care system supports proper supervision of children and documents the transitions of children to and from the care of teachers and parents or to and from classrooms. Similarly, in our other jurisdictions, we have procedures designed to support the tracking and movement of children.

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We aim to engage high-quality caregivers as part of the Bright Horizons back-up care network and require the center and in-home care providers that participate in our network to meet our standards of quality and safety. Providers in our back-up care network are required to comply, and remain compliant, with the requirements of state and local regulatory agencies and are selected and screened for their capability to provide high-quality care. We require our providers to meet a variety of specific requirements, including recruitment screening, reference checks, and background checks as well as to conduct regular training. Additionally, we provide ongoing oversight and monitoring of our back-up care services through regular audits, customer and family surveys and user feedback. Feedback received helps inform new or additional trainings, system improvements and policy or process enhancements to help ensure the ongoing health and safety of the children and adults in our care.

Classroom Health and Safety Practices

We adhere to rigorous health and hygiene practices in our early education and child care centers. Our protocols were developed in consideration of state and local public health guidelines and, in the U.S., in partnership with medical professionals and experts that specialize in pediatric infectious diseases. We adhere to all public health regulations and licensing requirements regarding child immunizations and other health practices required to maintain a healthy center environment. We maintain policies around the safe handling of food and medications, managing illness, allergies and health emergencies. Our health and safety team is dedicated to supporting our operations to ensure compliance with our policies and practices, and to ensure that we set high standards for health and hygiene.

We also employ a variety of security measures at our centers, including secure electronic access systems and teacher training on emergency response. Many of our centers are purpose built and designed with open concepts to help ensure the health and safety of children and to minimize the risk of injury to children by incorporating features such as child-sized amenities, rounded corners on furniture and fixtures, age-appropriate toys and equipment and cushioned fall zones surrounding play structures. Staff are trained in emergency preparedness, and we conduct regular disaster drills to ensure children and staff are kept safe and supported during an emergency situation.

Environmental

Our operations, including the selection and development of the properties that we lease or own, and any construction or improvements that we make at those locations, are subject to a variety of national and local laws and regulations, including building and fire code, environmental, zoning and land use requirements. In addition, we have a practice of conducting site evaluations on constructed or renovated properties that we own or lease. We have no known material environmental liabilities at this time. In addition, we comply with new and changing environmental and climate legislation and regulations in the jurisdictions in which we operate.

Data Protection, Privacy and Security

As part of our normal business activities, we collect, use, store, process and transmit personal information with respect to our clients, children, families and employees. Such activities are subject to a variety of state and national laws, rules, and regulations in each of the jurisdictions in which we operate. We will continue to comply with new and changing laws and regulations, including increasingly rigorous requirements related to data protection, privacy and security.

Facilities

Our early education and child care centers vary in location as well as design and capacity in accordance with industry standards and local regulatory requirements. Our North American early education and child care centers typically have an average capacity of approximately 130 children, and our locations outside North America have an average capacity of approximately 90 children. As of December 31, 2025, our early education and child care centers had a total licensed capacity of approximately 115,000 children, with the smallest center having a capacity of 20 children and the largest having a capacity of approximately 500 children.

We believe that attractive, spacious and child-friendly facilities with warm, nurturing and welcoming atmospheres are an important element in fostering a high-quality learning environment for children. Our centers are designed to be open and bright and to maximize visibility for supervision. We equip our centers with child-sized amenities and indoor and outdoor play areas comprised of age-appropriate materials and design. Commercial kitchens are typically present in those centers where regulations require that hot meals be prepared on-site.

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Available Information

We file or furnish reports and other information with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, (the “Exchange Act”). Our annual reports on Form 10-K, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, current reports on Form 8-K, and amendments to those reports are available free of charge on the Investor Relations section of our website, investors.brighthorizons.com, as soon as reasonably practicable after such material is electronically filed with or furnished to the SEC. Information filed electronically with, or furnished to, the SEC is also available at www.sec.gov. References to these websites do not constitute incorporation by reference of the information contained therein and should not be considered part of this document. Further, our references to website URLs are intended to be inactive textual references only.