The Consultant point of View

QNX Newsgroups (Archives) qdn.public.qnxrtp.advocacy
101

Alright you were screaming, although not loud enough for me to notice.
Guess you’d make one hell of a CEO, too bad you’re not :wink:

Just curious, have you indeed sold your RHAT shares at those prices as
you were intended? You must be rich then :slight_smile:

  • igor

Rennie Allen wrote:

Rennie Allen wrote:

Had time to look my post up, was on 1999/12/09, and here’s the contents.

John Pham wrote in message <82osds$> ncj@coco.eng.octel.com> >…
Here’s some fire for the open source

RHAT today worth $272 a share or has a market cap of $18 Billions
VaLinux today worth $269 a share probably has a market cap of
$15-18Billions

that’s LINUX (open source) to QNX closed source.

That’s moron investors; it has nothing to do with open vs. closed source.
Red Hat has a market cap of ~20 Billion US dollars, but an EPS of -0.01.
This is not sane. QNX is a private company, but I know for a fact that they
have positive earnings. If QNX were publicly traded, I would have a large
(relative to my portfolio > :slight_smile: > long position; I fully intend to have a large
short position on RHAT, as soon as I see the madness starting to wane.

Rennie

102

Igor Kovalenko wrote:

Just curious, have you indeed sold your RHAT shares at those prices as
you were intended? You must be rich then > :slight_smile:

Unfortunately I didn’t take my own advice in this particular case;
perhaps that is why I am not a CEO (inability to follow through :slight_smile:

btw: I am long on MOT right now (I happen to think quite highly of MOT’s
management).

103

All these things take time Martin, or huge (I mean HUGE) $$. The Intel
Inside campaign, for instance, was an $800 Million campaign… $800 million
in one year. It’s a case study that everyone who as a component supplier
(like QNX is) would like to imitate. But it’s also a place that we can’t
start at today. You can’t do television effectively with less than a $100
million budget. Even Wind River or Microsoft doesn’t spend this kind of
money in the embedded space.

Having said that, there are other ways to skin this cat. I just finished a
press tour on the east coast yesterday, where we met with reporters from the
usual suspects in the technical press, plus some of the higher profile
American business media. I told them about the successes we’ve been having
in the auto space recently, and why companies have been choosing us. One
solid article in Forbes, Wired, BusinessWeek, the Wall Street Journal, or a
variety of other publications focused on the business decision maker would
do a lot to raise our profile.

One thing that you folks can do to help us is to let us know when you’re
involved in an innovative QNX project. The press wants to write customer
stories, and showing that we have lots of customers doing innovative things,
will help us a lot to make that visibility possible.

And by the way, thanks for all the input. Good ideas come from this kind of
dialog.

Alec.

Alec Saunders (alecs@qnx.com)
VP Marketing, QNX Software Systems Limited

104

Hi…

Martin Zimmerman wrote:

If that means colorful poster-sized ads in international airports, then do it.

Now this is a very good point!

If decision makers do something, that is: they travel!

We have a ton of projects with DARPA, and the DARPA PMs travel
constantly! If the first thing thy see when they come out of the
airplane is a QNX board, then they’ll be less biased against QNX. :slight_smile:

Good point!

Miguel.


–
Martin Zimmerman > camz@passageway.com
Camz Software Enterprises > www.passageway.com/camz/qnx/
QNX Programming & Consulting

–

my opinions are mine, only mine, solely mine, and they are not related
in any possible way to the institution(s) in which I study and work.

Miguel Simon
Research Engineer
School of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering
University of Oklahoma
http://www.amerobotics.ou.edu/
http://www.saic.com

105

Previously, Rennie Allen wrote in qdn.public.qnxrtp.advocacy:

What we are talking about is the management capability of the company.
I say that Nortels management did not perform as well as QSSL
management. Would it be great if QNX got more name recognition ? Sure.

I disagree, but then I work for Nortel, and I have had the inside view
of what management was doing. I can’t officially comment on some
things, but I will say this… the management problems that affected
Nortel WERE NOT at the top. John Roth did a superb job, and if you look
back on things, you will note that the ENTIRE telecom industry reported
the same issues, the same dramatic shift in spending levels. You will
also notice that Nortel was the FIRST to point this out to the public
and adjust their forecast.

Really, Rennie, you sound like an investor that got burned (which is
pretty much any Canadian, since Nortel was in damned near every canadian
investment portfolio and mutual fund out there). I’m one of those
shareholders too, but a slightly better educated one.

We have some REAL issues that we need to address with QNX and QSSL that
are of interest and relevance to us all. I’m very disappointed that
you’ve allowed yourself to be sidetracked (rathole!) by the mention of
Nortel and their stock performance of late, which wasn’t even the point
of the story.

If we allow ourselves to become disctracted we won’t be able to solve
any of these problems.

I find it VERY encouraging that Alec has been discussing things with us
and that he has shown not only a willingness to share information, but
to listen to us as well. It’s not everyday that the VP of Marketing does
that with the “little guys”. Lets not waste Alec’s time with distrating
discussions of Nortel.

Could QSSL management do better ? Yes. Should QSSL look to emulate
Nortels performance over the past four years ? I don’t think so.

In terms of brand identity and awareness, absolutely.

Being a CEO sucks, plain and simple, someone will always take a shot
at you, regarless of whether your company is performing well, or not.

Cheers,
Camz.

–
Martin Zimmerman camz@passageway.com
Camz Software Enterprises www.passageway.com/camz/qnx/
QNX Programming & Consulting

106

Previously, Miguel Simon wrote in qdn.public.qnxrtp.advocacy:

We have a ton of projects with DARPA, and the DARPA PMs travel
constantly! If the first thing thy see when they come out of the
airplane is a QNX board, then they’ll be less biased against QNX. > :slight_smile:

Heh heh. If you are thinking of DARPA, then you would probably put the
first ad posters in the Huntsville, Alabama airport, eh?

Cheers,
Camz.

–
Martin Zimmerman camz@passageway.com
Camz Software Enterprises www.passageway.com/camz/qnx/
QNX Programming & Consulting

107

I agree. Besides, it is not really valid comparision (QNX vs Nortel). QNX is
software maker. Increasing sales for them just means stamping more CDs,
plus some expansion of support personnel. Perhaps some expansion of
development, but not much. If you need to cut back, that is not very painful
either. All you have to do is lay off some people and there are usually some
who you would not mind to lose anyway :wink:

Nortel makes money mostly on hardware (that is my guess, but it is true for
Motorola). To increase production you need LAND, FACILITIES, EQUIPMENT and
PEOPLE. There are also associated energy and material costs. And you must
expand your testing capacity proportionally, because unlike software makers
you have to actually test every unit you sell, not just prototype! That
stuff is so expensive that you have to finance it through major lenders. It
is not hard to do when you’re on a roll, but if downturn happens things
become NASTY. As soon as your sales/profits fall, lenders downgrade your
credit rating and you suddenly have more to pay with less income. On top of
that there’s excessive stock of unsold goods. And facilities which continue
to produce even more unsold goods at ever increasing cost. Or may be they
don’t, but that is even worse - you still have to pay maintenance expenses
and salaries to people. Either way, you become a big cash burning factory.
You’re lucky if you can sell off some excessive manufacturing capacity
quickly enough. In reality that is usually hard to do and you have to sell
or close whole business divisions. So you don’t just trim some fat, you
actually lose some bones. Should I tell you that is world of PAIN.

  • igor

“Martin Zimmerman” <camz@passageway.com> wrote in message
news:Voyager.020209000914.1935B@wooga.wooga.passageway.com…

Previously, Rennie Allen wrote in qdn.public.qnxrtp.advocacy:
What we are talking about is the management capability of the company.
I say that Nortels management did not perform as well as QSSL
management. Would it be great if QNX got more name recognition ? Sure.

I disagree, but then I work for Nortel, and I have had the inside view
of what management was doing. I can’t officially comment on some
things, but I will say this… the management problems that affected
Nortel WERE NOT at the top. John Roth did a superb job, and if you look
back on things, you will note that the ENTIRE telecom industry reported
the same issues, the same dramatic shift in spending levels. You will
also notice that Nortel was the FIRST to point this out to the public
and adjust their forecast.

Really, Rennie, you sound like an investor that got burned (which is
pretty much any Canadian, since Nortel was in damned near every canadian
investment portfolio and mutual fund out there). I’m one of those
shareholders too, but a slightly better educated one.

We have some REAL issues that we need to address with QNX and QSSL that
are of interest and relevance to us all. I’m very disappointed that
you’ve allowed yourself to be sidetracked (rathole!) by the mention of
Nortel and their stock performance of late, which wasn’t even the point
of the story.

If we allow ourselves to become disctracted we won’t be able to solve
any of these problems.

I find it VERY encouraging that Alec has been discussing things with us
and that he has shown not only a willingness to share information, but
to listen to us as well. It’s not everyday that the VP of Marketing does
that with the “little guys”. Lets not waste Alec’s time with distrating
discussions of Nortel.

Could QSSL management do better ? Yes. Should QSSL look to emulate
Nortels performance over the past four years ? I don’t think so.

In terms of brand identity and awareness, absolutely.

Being a CEO sucks, plain and simple, someone will always take a shot
at you, regarless of whether your company is performing well, or not.

Cheers,
Camz.

–
Martin Zimmerman > camz@passageway.com
Camz Software Enterprises > www.passageway.com/camz/qnx/
QNX Programming & Consulting

108

On Fri, 8 Feb 2002 08:36:40 -0500, “Alec Saunders” <alecs@qnx.com> wrote:

All these things take time Martin, or huge (I mean HUGE) $$. The Intel
Inside campaign, for instance, was an $800 Million campaign… $800 million
in one year. It’s a case study that everyone who as a component supplier
(like QNX is) would like to imitate. But it’s also a place that we can’t
start at today. You can’t do television effectively with less than a $100
million budget. Even Wind River or Microsoft doesn’t spend this kind of
money in the embedded space.

Having said that, there are other ways to skin this cat. I just finished a
press tour on the east coast yesterday, where we met with reporters from the
usual suspects in the technical press, plus some of the higher profile
American business media. I told them about the successes we’ve been having
in the auto space recently, and why companies have been choosing us. One
solid article in Forbes, Wired, BusinessWeek, the Wall Street Journal, or a
variety of other publications focused on the business decision maker would
do a lot to raise our profile.

As someone said, the fact that QNX is not listed makes getting publicity
harder.
A question from an investing ignoramus: then why not list?

The objective is to make QNX a bigger and more visible company,
not to make a killing in the listing process, not so?
Then non-technical things like turing a profit, growing 20% etc
when everyone else in that industry and even competitors is bleeding
cash and people, will be significant and resources ($) will pour in.
Then this will get us all those goodies like super nice dev tools etc.

There must a lot $$$ waiting for those companies bringing good news
for investors…

I am missing something here.

109

Alex Cellarius wrote:


As someone said, the fact that QNX is not listed makes getting publicity
harder.
A question from an investing ignoramus: then why not list?

One reason to not list is because once you are public, you have to
answer to the shareholders. This impacts what can be done in terms of
R&D, since you must show progress each quarter (increasing revenue,
and/or lower expenses). Generally, for a leading edge company being
public is not all it’s cracked up to be. I am sure QSSL has taken big
hits in revenues in order to make big technological gains (I know they
have, that’s why I like QNX).

The objective is to make QNX a bigger and more visible company,
not to make a killing in the listing process, not so?

This is true.

Then non-technical things like turing a profit, growing 20% etc
when everyone else in that industry and even competitors is bleeding
cash and people, will be significant and resources ($) will pour in.
Then this will get us all those goodies like super nice dev tools etc.

Aahhh, but you may be bleeding to, when you haven’t been able to make
the big investments (aka gambles) since you are trying to pay
shareholders rather than invest in innovative technology (shareholders
don’t like big gambles :slight_smile:.


There must a lot $$$ waiting for those companies bringing good news
for investors…

Yes. I think that once QSSL has settled on which O/S they are finally
going to stick with (3rd time lucky I hope :wink:, then QSSL should go
public (after nailing down a vertical or two). At this point they’ll be
making only evolutionary improvements to the product and investors
really will like them.


I am missing something here.

Not really.

110

A public share offering has a number of variables associated with it, and
the ease with which one can generate publicity is just one.

–
Alec Saunders (alecs@qnx.com)
VP Marketing, QNX Software Systems Limited

111

I’m not sure going public is the best answer. Seems to me that some control
of the product may be lost. There is a lot of pressure to please stock
holders. This could be good, but it could also be bad. But this is my own
inexperienced and un-educated opinion.

Kevin

“Alex Cellarius” <acellarius@systems104-don’t-you-spam-me!.co.za> wrote in
message news:1105_1013287636@pentiumii…

On Fri, 8 Feb 2002 08:36:40 -0500, “Alec Saunders” <> alecs@qnx.com> > wrote:

All these things take time Martin, or huge (I mean HUGE) $$. The Intel
Inside campaign, for instance, was an $800 Million campaign… $800
million
in one year. It’s a case study that everyone who as a component supplier
(like QNX is) would like to imitate. But it’s also a place that we
can’t
start at today. You can’t do television effectively with less than a
$100
million budget. Even Wind River or Microsoft doesn’t spend this kind of
money in the embedded space.

Having said that, there are other ways to skin this cat. I just
finished a
press tour on the east coast yesterday, where we met with reporters from
the
usual suspects in the technical press, plus some of the higher profile
American business media. I told them about the successes we’ve been
having
in the auto space recently, and why companies have been choosing us.
One
solid article in Forbes, Wired, BusinessWeek, the Wall Street Journal,
or a
variety of other publications focused on the business decision maker
would
do a lot to raise our profile.

As someone said, the fact that QNX is not listed makes getting publicity
harder.
A question from an investing ignoramus: then why not list?

The objective is to make QNX a bigger and more visible company,
not to make a killing in the listing process, not so?
Then non-technical things like turing a profit, growing 20% etc
when everyone else in that industry and even competitors is bleeding
cash and people, will be significant and resources ($) will pour in.
Then this will get us all those goodies like super nice dev tools etc.

There must a lot $$$ waiting for those companies bringing good news
for investors…

I am missing something here.

112

Hi…

Martin Zimmerman wrote:

Previously, Miguel Simon wrote in qdn.public.qnxrtp.advocacy:
We have a ton of projects with DARPA, and the DARPA PMs travel
constantly! If the first thing thy see when they come out of the
airplane is a QNX board, then they’ll be less biased against QNX. > :slight_smile:

Heh heh. If you are thinking of DARPA, then you would probably put the
first ad posters in the Huntsville, Alabama airport, eh?

You are right! :slight_smile:

A list of Canada/US airports would be something like (no particular
order):

  1. Orlando: decision makers go to and can afford Disney World!
  2. Houston: because
  3. Huntsville: of
  4. the cape?: NASA executives?
  5. LAX
  6. DFW
  7. Denver
  8. Atlanta
  9. Detroit
  10. Toronto
  11. Ottawa: for obvious reasons…
  12. Seattle:
  13. Chicago
  14. San Francisco:

If each airport ad would costs -naive number here- about $10000.00
dollars, that would amount to about $140000.00 dollars. Could QSSL
afford this? Humm…

What about international airports? Rome, Paris, London and Frankfurt
come to mind… Oh, ok, what am I saying? …I was thinking of a
vacation. :slight_smile:) Then again, for those who live in Europe, that would be a
week end drive…

Miguel.

Cheers,
Camz.

–
Martin Zimmerman > camz@passageway.com
Camz Software Enterprises > www.passageway.com/camz/qnx/
QNX Programming & Consulting