Good morning and welcome to the Upwork Incorporated twenty twenty one Annual Meeting of Stockholders. Please note that this event is being webcast. I would now like to introduce and turn the conference over to President and Chief Executive Officer of Upwork, Ms. Hayden Brown. Ms.
Brown, please proceed.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Welcome and thanks for joining us for Upwork's twenty twenty one Annual Meeting of Stockholders. I'm Hayden Brown, President and Chief Executive Officer of Upwork. I will act as the Chair of this annual meeting and now call the meeting to order.
We are excited to be hosting our annual meeting virtually with our stockholders attending via our web meeting portal. Through this online platform, we believe we are able to increase stockholder participation and reach a greater number of our stockholders. We also believe that our virtual stockholder meeting provides greater access and a safer forum in light of ongoing COVID safety considerations. In addition to myself, I'd like to introduce the other Board members who are on the call today. Thomas Layton, Upwork's Chairperson of the Board Gregory Grech, Kevin Harvey, Elizabeth Nelson, Leila Srinivasan, Gary Steele and Annie Lou Vasquez Ubari.
And other members of Upwork's senior leadership team participating in today's meeting are Jeff McCombs, Chief Financial Officer Eric Gilpin, Senior Vice President, Sales Lars Esbjornsson, Senior Vice President, Marketing Sam Bright, Chief Product and Experience Officer Zoe Hart, Chief People Officer and Brian Levy, Chief Business Affairs and Legal Officer and Secretary. At this time, I would like to introduce Brian Levy, our Chief Business Affairs and Legal Officer and Secretary, who will act as Secretary of this annual meeting and keep the minutes. Brian will now begin the formal matters to be discussed at this meeting.
Thanks, Hayden. I'm advised by the inspector of election that over a majority of the voting power of our outstanding common stock entitled to vote at this meeting is present or represented by proxy here today and that a quorum is therefore present. We will describe the proposals that are to be voted on today later on during the meeting. Polls are now open for voting. The voting today is by proxy and electronic ballot.
Any stockholder who has not voted or wishes to change their vote may do so by clicking on the voting button on the webcast portal and following the instructions there. Stockholders who have sent in proxies or previously voted via the Internet or by phone and who do not wish to change their vote do not need to take further action. Their votes will be counted automatically. We expect to close the polls approximately one minute after the presentation of the matters to be voted upon at the meeting and question and answer session. We will answer questions regarding matters to be voted upon at the meeting after all matters have been presented as appropriate.
Stockholders are limited to one question each. The time permitted for the Q and A session will be limited to ten minutes. Please note that stockholders who desire to ask a question may do so by presenting the question in writing where indicated on the webcast portal for this meeting. Only stockholders will be permitted to present questions, and you must have your 16 digit control number to do so. This meeting is being recorded.
However, no one attending via the webcast is permitted to use any recording device. A webcast playback will be available at the same link for this meeting within twenty four hours of the meeting. The webcast will be available for up to ninety days after this meeting. At this point, I would also like to introduce a few more people who are in attendance at today's meeting. Jeff Mullenhauer and Nancy Track of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, our independent registered public accounting firm.
Mr. Mullenhauer and Ms. Tracht will be available during the question and answer session to respond to appropriate questions. Gene Capello of C. T.
Hagberg LLC will act as the inspector of election for this meeting and tabulate results of the voting. Mr. Capello has executed the oath of inspector of election. Let me now turn to the formal business of this meeting. The proposals to be considered at this meeting are described in our proxy statement dated 04/20/2021, and I will review these in a few minutes.
But first, I will report on the notice for this meeting. Our board of directors fixed 04/05/2021 as the record date for determining the stockholders entitled to vote at this meeting. I present to this meeting an affidavit of Broadridge Financial Services, attesting that a notice of Internet availability of proxy materials was mailed commencing on or about 04/21/2021 to all of Upwork's stockholders of record determined as of the close of business on the record date. The affidavit will be incorporated into the minutes of this meeting. I have a list of the stockholders entitled to vote at this meeting, which is available for inspection by any stockholder present or by any proxy holder representing a stockholder and which list will be filed with the records of this meeting.
The registered stockholder list is available for the duration of the meeting and can be found on the meeting page in the footer section. The list of stockholders shows that as of the record date, there were 125,962,107 shares of our common stock outstanding and entitled to vote at this meeting, with each share of common stock entitled to one vote. As previously mentioned, the inspector of election has advised that over a majority of the voting power of our outstanding common stock entitled to vote at this meeting is present or represented by proxy here today and that a quorum is therefore present. This meeting is therefore authorized to transact business. Now I will present the matters to be voted upon.
As stated in the notice of this annual meeting and our proxy statement, the first item of business is to elect three class three directors, each to serve a three year term expiring at the twenty twenty four annual meeting of stockholders and until his or her successor has been elected and qualified or until his or her earlier death, resignation, or removal. The director nominees are Hayden Brown, Gregory C. Grech, and Anilu Vasquez Ubart. No other director nominees have been properly submitted for election pursuant to our bylaws or the Securities and Exchange Commission rules. Therefore, no other nominations may be accepted.
The board of directors recommends a four the election of each of the nominated directors. As secretary of this annual meeting and on behalf of the board of directors, I move for the election of each of the nominated directors, which motion is seconded by proxy. The second item of business is to ratify the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as our independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending 12/31/2021. The Board of Directors recommends a vote for the ratification of the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. As secretary of this annual meeting and on behalf of the board of directors, I move for approval of this proposal, which motion is seconded by proxy.
The third item of business is to vote on a nonbinding advisory basis to approve the compensation of our named executive officers. The board of directors recommends a vote for the approval on a nonbinding advisory basis of the compensation of our named executive officers. As secretary of this annual meeting and on behalf of the board of directors, I move for approval of this proposal, which motion is seconded by proxy. That concludes the discussion of the proposals. We will now address any questions relevant to the proposals that stockholders have submitted through the webcast portal.
Please note that we will not address any questions that are not relevant to the matters presented at this meeting. However, if anyone has a question that is relevant to our business, but not relevant to the matters presented at this meeting, there will be an opportunity to ask questions at Upwork's upcoming Investor Day on June 15. If you have not already submitted a question and wish to do so, please enter your question now. As noted earlier, stockholders are limited to one question each. The time permitted for the question and answer session will be limited to ten minutes.
If we do not receive any relevant questions, we will conclude the Q and A session earlier. If you have a question about a specific Upwork service offering or your customer account, please feel free to send those questions to the following e mail address: stockholdercustomerquestions,1word,@upwork.com. We received questions that are not relevant to the proposals, and as such, we will not be addressing such questions at this time. We will now conclude the question and answer section. As noted earlier, the voting today is by proxy and electronic ballot.
Any stockholder who has not voted or wishes to change their vote may do so by clicking on the voting button on the webcast portal and following the instructions there. Stockholders who have sent in proxies or previously voted via the Internet or by phone and who do not wish to change their vote do not need to take further action. Their votes will be counted automatically. We expect to leave the polls open for approximately one minute to allow anyone who chooses to vote here to cast ballots. Time begins now.
Now that everyone has had the opportunity to vote, I now declare the polls for the twenty twenty one Annual Meeting of Stockholders of Upwork Inc. Closed. We now have preliminary voting results. Directors elected pursuant to proposal one are elected by a plurality of the votes of the shares of capital stock present in person or represented by proxy at the meeting and entitled to vote on the election of directors, which means that the three nominees receiving the highest number of affirmative votes will be elected to the board of directors. Based on results as tabulated by the inspector of election, Hayden Brown, Gregory C.
Gretsch, and Anilu Basqua Zubari are the three nominees on the ballot who received the highest number of affirmative votes cast, with each receiving support of at least 87% of the votes cast. And therefore, each nominee has been elected to the board of directors. The vote required to approve proposal two is the affirmative vote of the holders of a majority of the voting power of the shares of capital stock entitled to vote on proposal two that are present in person or represented by proxy at the meeting and are voted for or against the matter. Based on results tabulated by the inspector of election, the proposal to ratify the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP has been approved by over 99% of the votes cast. The vote required to approve Proposal is the affirmative vote of the holders of a majority of the voting power of shares of capital stock entitled to vote on proposal three that are present in person or represented by proxy at the meeting and are voted for or against the matter.
Based on results tabulated by the inspector of election, the proposal to approve on a nonbinding advisory basis, the compensation of our named executive officers has been approved by over 96% of the votes cast. There are no other formal items of business before this meeting. Final results of the vote will be recorded as stated in the minutes of this meeting and also as filed with the SEC on Form eight ks within four business days. Thank you to those who participated in today's virtual meeting and to those stockholders who submitted a question. This now concludes our annual meeting, and the meeting is now adjourned.
This concludes Upwork Incorporated's twenty twenty one Annual Stockholders Meeting. A replay of the meeting will be available within twenty four hours at the website you logged into today. Thank you for attending. Have a great day, and you may now disconnect from the meeting.