Not Netscape or Sun. A VS buyer puts money into Bidzos/RSA/Security
Dynamics, MSFT, INTC, Visa, CSCO, et al pockets. VS more likely to buy NSCP in a couple of years! Sun's not a good fit for many, many reasons. IBM/Equifax is NOT competition to VS.
Direct competition to VS comes from Entrust, Cybertrust, and
completely different technologies. If Digital Ids are the thing,
VeriSign's the place. No guarrantee that DIDs are it, though.
IBM has ads all over the tube about Internet security - I guess
they're talking about hardening the boxes because you can't get a
DID from them. It would be a good fit (nobody's particulary angry
at IBM the way ORCL,NSCP,MSFT,etc duke it out) so the 'trusted third
party' idea still works. IBM is one of those companies like AT&T
and Disney that has almost universal respect and positive spin
going.
VS will acquire more companies (SecureIT was a nice pickup) and
gain strength and re-gain momentum. New shares on the market should
stabilize the price somewhat - as much as 'Net stocks can ever be
stable. If they keep pressing hard they can stay ahead and keep making
(and keeping) the big banks, BT, AT&T type of deals.
- Jerry |
