Press COnference Transcript:
>>Subj: press conf transcript part 1
Date: 96-06-18 21:15:45 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
Iomega Corporate News Releases
The following is the full transcript of Iomega's press conference at
PC Expo in New York City.
IOMEGA PRESS CONFERENCE AT PC EXPO
June 18, 1996, 5:00 p.m. EST, Jacob Javits Center
MR. GROLNICK: How is everyone doing? Thanks for waiting. My
name is Andy Grolnick. I am the Zip product manager. I want to
thank you guys for waiting and welcome you here members of the
press and our OEM partners who are here with us today at this
exciting time for Iomega. We have some really big stuff to talk to you
about today. We use this word quite a bit at Iomega. I want to get
right to it and introduce the leader of the new Iomega, Mr. Kim
Edwards.
MR. EDWARDS: Hi. Can you hear better now? They turned the
volume up a little bit there. I appreciate that, Andy. I do want to
thank all of you for attending this afternoon. I appreciate your
patience with us this evening. We waited for the show to clear a
little bit.
We are here to provide the latest chapter in Iomega's story of
creating new standards. We have a lot of ground to cover, but we
really want to start with our expanding list of OEM partners with the
new products in the Zip family in the areas that will create even
greater demand and opportunities for Zip. Our VP of marketing will
come up and tell you about some of the new announcements and
then following his presentation, we will have a chance for Q and A.
Give you a chance, specifically the press, to ask the questions you are
looking forward to. But first, though, I would like to share with you
our vision for the future.
Iomega is not only ready for the future, we are creating it with the
products that address the needs of customers like yourselves. I said it
before, but let me repeat this. This is fundamental tenet of the
company: The company is based on the premise that we will give
you the customers the products that you want when you want them
at a price that you can afford to pay. Very simple, but complex in
terms of pulling it off. This is a winning strategy that is common in
the world of consumer products, but somewhat new to the world of
technology. We, Iomega, are consumerizing technology today. The
strategy works and it will continue to work because it is the only
premise upon which a broad-based consumer business can be built.
Subj: press conf transcript #2
Date: 96-06-18 21:17:18 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
No question about it. Our product shipments prove it. The
involvement of our many notable partners prove it. And the
overwhelming response of more than 2 million enthusiastic Zip
users prove it beyond a doubt. All of this happened in a little over a
year. That is why we talk about the story of smashing paradigms.
Since the introduction of Zip in March 1995, since then to say the
least it has been a fun and equally exciting ride. In fact, many of you
in the audience have given us rave reviews. These include more
than 25 industry awards and editorial coverage from all of you in the
computer industry to magazines like Vogue, Business Week and
even on the Today Show. As rewarding as the coverage has been, I
always thought our little blue box, the Zip drive, has certain star
quality. It is quality that has not really been discovered by Hollywood
yet. This weekend that all changes. Zip makes it feature film debut
playing opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger in the new movie Eraser.
Next year when we meet with you we expect to have Variety or
Hollywood Reporter added to our list and maybe even a Oscar
alongside all those industry trophies you graciously honored us
with. Maybe I am stretching it a bit, but Zip is such a immediate hit
with all of the consumers that I am beginning to think anything is
possible with a little blue drive. Since March of last year, Zip has
become the hottest selling peripheral certainly in the United States
and we believe in the world. As I indicated a moment ago, more
than 2 million Zip drives have been sold in only 14 months. So I
think it is fair warning to say watch out, Arnold, you may have the
muscle, but that little blue drive of ours is the panache that people
can't seem to resist. I mean if you go back to the beginning, we just
couldn't make enough of them. Many of you in the room know that
and in some ways it was a nice problem to have unless you were one
of those people who needed Zip because there was no other solution.
Now, in the upcoming few weeks, we expect to make several
announcements that will totally eliminate any issues in terms of our
ability to supply the OEM buy-in to make Zip the standard for the
floppy of the multimedia age. Now, you think about this. All of this
for a disk drive and a blue one at that. The industry told us you will
probably sell a couple hundred thousand of these, but you, the
consumer, said we will sell millions. Who would have thought that
this was possible. Children's toys sell out, movies sell out, new cars
sell out, now we have proven that even disk drives can sell out.
Once again, we are smashing paradigms, in fact, our first year's sales
of Zip rivaled those of RCA's direct satellite system TV, possibly the
hottest consumer product in the history of consumer electronics.
Subj: transcript part 3
Date: 96-06-18 21:18:16 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
(sorry i can't seem to get this in one message)
The reason for Zip's overnight success is worth considering for a
moment because it fore shadows an important future trend. We are
fast approaching a time when half of all Americans have their own
PCs. Either they work on one at the office or at their home and more
often than not, it will be in both places. Just at the time when
increasing numbers of people needed to store more information, the
existing methods of storage became outdated. Think about it. 1.4
megabyte floppies, traditional fixed-capacity hard drives, to quote
Arnold, hasta la vista, baby, Zip is in. Why is this? Why are the old
methods of information storage becoming outdated so quickly?
Simply because today's applications are bigger than ever and people
want to do more things with their computers. For all the users who
rushed out to install Windows 95, I think very few realized how
much of their hard drive would be gobbled up even before they left
the store. Our studies indicate that as much as half of a megabyte
hard drive is used up before you even get home. And it is not just
Windows 95 or application suites. It is all the new things that make
personal computing so exciting today.Video, net surfers
downloading, all kinds of information, digital imaging and all those
digitalized business presentations like the one you are seeing here.
Ever try to store something like this in a floppy? Very simply, they
are too slow and they are not big enough and I think if you look up
in the dictionary that suggests obsolete. Iomega saw this coming and
so did the consumers who are shelling out up to $3,000 for a PC and
they had nowhere to store this stuff. So we made Zip big. We gave it
more than 70 times the capacity of a floppy. We made it attractive
but unassuming, fast enough to play AVI files and very importantly,
we made it affordable. Consumers saw all this and realized we have
given them infinite capacity, boundless flexibility and even built-in
backup all for 199 bucks. Other factors also account for Zip appeal,
like the fact that the disks are ideal for storage requirements of new
software being introduced today. The Internet is growing extremely
fast. Today, there are an estimated 26 million users downloading
files ranging from a few megabytes to hundreds. A single download
from the Web can require more space than a entire software
application did just a few years ago and it is not just computers. We
can see significant growth coming quickly in emerging areas like
digital photography and imaging which should explode over the
next few months and create a whole new application for storage than
those old floppies can deliver. Zip is the right product for those
applications. It provides consumers maximum freedom by giving
them maximum storage. Iomega is the only viable solution for
today's PC customer.
While the response we have had from consumers is exciting, what is
equally important is the reaction we have had from the major PC
manufacturers. Even though the Zip drive started shipping five
months ago, we already started relationships with the biggest OEMs
in the world which are now building Zips in select models of their
PCs. Partnerships with Hewlett Packard, IBM, Power Computer, NEC
are certainly gratifying, but quite frankly not really surprising to us.
Some of the news reports about Zip in particular have made us
think about Kevin Costner's famous baseball movie, Field of
Dreams. You know the scene, there he was, he stands in an empty
corn field and a voice says to him "If you build it, they will come."
Now, I will say, as much as it may seem that there were times that it
was easy, I can assure you this was a tough job creating Zip listening
to your needs and then responding, hitting the right price points and
the capability of the drive.
Subj: transcript #4
Date: 96-06-18 21:19:44 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
We did do a lot of homework. We talked to thousands of people like
yourselves, small business owners, teachers, corporations, parents,
college students, kids just learning to play video games, we just
asked them what they wanted and they told us and we designed the
perfect solution for them, the ubiquitous little blue Zip drive. We
are confident that it has already become the new industry standard
because Zip is much more than a floppy. It is a upgrade to your
entire system. Whether it is just making your editorial lives easier
or providing a distinct competitive advantage, Zip is there helping
you share, manage and store all of your important stuff.
To provide more about the latest chapter in our story of how Iomega
is creating standards and continue to smash paradigms, I welcome
Tim Hill, our vice president of worldwide marketing. Tim?
MR. HILL: Thank you, Kim. As most of you know, needless to say,
our marketing initiatives are usually a little bit left to center. Iomega,
in marketing, if you want to be successful on our team, it is not good
enough to think outside the box. You had better operate outside of
the box. Whether it is our national advertising, print or broadcast,
which most of you have seen in your local market, our point of sale
at local retails, or even a little Hollywood at trade shows such as PC
Expo, Iomega is far from a traditional computer products marketer.
But when it comes to the business imperatives including executing
the basics required to set a standard in any industry, we are definitely
not left of center. We believe we are right on target.
Let me go back to a slide Kim showed you just a few moments ago.
Hewlett Packard, Micron, Power Computing, Packard Bell were just
among the very first OEMs to work with Zip and they did it for one
reason and one reason alone, consumer acceptance, that Zip is the
hottest peripheral product on the market today and maybe ever at
this price point. It is the best storage solution for business and
personal stuff whether you are in the office or at home. Needless to
say, we are proud of the companies that we keep. Our list of partners
continues to grow and just a moment you will hear about a few
more.
As some of you know, we announced IBM will build an internal Zip
drive in a model of their Aptiva product line beginning in the third
quarter. In addition, we announced NEC, one of the largest
commercial PC companies. They will include Zip in selected models
of their popular ready home computers and their very broadly
distributed Power Mate pro commercial PCs also starting in the third
quarter. Today it is with great pleasure and excitement I announce
two more of the OEM partners who have a line of our Iomega Zip
drive. Unisys and Ban Dai.
Unisys is a world leader in enterprise computing. They are going to
include Zip as a standard feature in select models of their new
Aquanta line PC shown in the show. They will offer Zip across their
entire line of PCs as a company also beginning in the third quarter of
this year. Representing the next generation of games, Ban Dai, who
created those wildly successful Power Ranger, they are going to offer
their opinion at World Gaming system platform with the Zip drive
by the end of 1996.
Subj: transcript #5
Date: 96-06-18 21:20:52 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
I am proud to say that today Iomega can count on five of the top
seven PC marketers as manufacturers who are supporting the Zip
platform and in addition, look at the strong stable of partners who
are supporting the Zip technology. Companies like Fuji, Maxell,
Sony, Seiko-Epson, Mega Media, TDK, Memorex and Sentinel. Guess
what, all of these people are engaged in manufacturing. We have the
support of every major floppy disk and drive manufacturer in the
world. Acer and Ban Dai, we will -- two of the early leaders in the
emerging market for low cost Internet PCs. As you know, we also
have the support of virtually every major retailer, cataloguer and
distributor worldwide and many of these partners are in the
audience today and we thank you for your support and presence.
All of these partners join the millions of consumers, and that is
what we are here to do, sell to end users, living, breathing human
beings who are using Zip drives. With over 2 million shipments on
our resume we feel confident in claiming Zip as the de facto
standard in personal storage. It is the right solution now with the
software interface and the price points it is the right solution for the
future.
Let me also point out and this is a key point Zip is not just that cool
little blue drive that we are all so familiar with. It is a full product
line that includes internal, external versions as well as some new
models we are going to launch today. These are perfect storage
solutions for both the commercial, the graphics and the home user
as well as other different applications. We have internal and
external Zip drives that OEMs and consumers are buying today but
to address the portable market, we also have after-market solutions
and a new standard solution which we are going to show you in just
a moment.
About one show ago we really had a serious launch of Zip unleashed
which for a portable storage solution is the first mobile rechargeable
battery pack available at the $49.95 street price, and it will be shipping
in the third quarter. It is designed with a consumer in mind. It has
flip-out charging prongs that even fit on a power strip. It gives you
over two hours run time, read and write time on a Zip drive and
makes it truly portable matching the needs of the person who is
using a notebook or laptop computer. We also have the first $99 Zip
card PCMCIA connector card so obviously with the portable Zip,
weighing in a little under a pound and these accessories, you have
mobile computing today.
However, today we are also pleased to announce an even further
solution, one as usual that raises the bar for the competition and the
rest of the industry. The latest extension, a 15 millimeter high
internal Zip drive for portable computer manufacturers OEM's
basically.
Subj: transcript #6
Date: 96-06-18 21:22:11 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
Our research has shown that end users are clamoring for a solution
just like this. Something they can read and write to that they can
transport files, they can become truly mobile with their mobile
computer. We believe this market segment holds significant
potential for further growth of Zip and will further extend our
industry standard.
I also would like to briefly touch on a very strategic Iomega program,
one that is very similar to Intel Inside, it is Iomega Ready. Simply
put for OEMs, consumers and channel partners, Iomega Ready is
what really can represent Zip as a standard. We have created a
number of reasons why this will be true. For OEM partners, it
ensures a market and technology platform including software
interface that means that their end users will be assured of smooth
seamless operation of Iomega solutions including Zip going forward.
We also can assure our channel partners that they are going to have
aggressive marketing tools including co-op to make sure that their
end users, their consumers are assured when they buy a software or
hardware application including desk top and mobile PC they are
going to have a built-in Iomega solution, the drives will work
seamlessly. It assures our channel partners that we will help them
drive demand for not just our products but other products from
other OEM partners. Most importantly Iomega Ready assures
customers that the PC that they are buying will accept Zip disk
seamlessly and flawlessly whether for their tax information, their
graphics or their games or whatever they use at work or at home or
back and forth.
To summarize why we have very sound beliefs that the foundation
is sound to make Zip the standard today going forward, first our
industry partners dominate the computer industry today, including
heavy hitters like IBM, Packard Bell, HP, Acer and others, and
second we have proven that the Zip technology is viable in the most
critical area and that is with people like you and I, consumers who
lay out their hard earned cash to buy the product. Zip fans today
number well over 2 million worldwide. They are converted in a
little over a year. Pretty incredible for a new peripheral product.
Third, Zip is an ideal fit for emerging consumer as well as OEM PC
applications such as internet PCs. This morning USA Today shows
we are right on trend in going after this opportunity. They had a
special section Crossroads for Computing. In this article, IDC
predicted that mobile portable computer units will grow 28 percent
this year worldwide versus 17 percent for desk top PCs. It allows Zip
drive to hit the sweet spot at every front in the marketplace. Finally
the 15 millimeter Zip will take personal mobile solutions to the next
level. We believe Zip is the industry standard for personal storage. I
would like to thank you for your time. Thank you all of our partners
who have attended today and let me have Andy Grolnick come back
up here and open our Q and A session. Thank you.
Subj: conference Q and A #1
Date: 96-06-18 21:23:50 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
Thank you.
MR. GROLNICK: I would like to ask Kim Edwards to come back up
here to participate in the Q and A. I want to open it up to questions
from members of the press only and please if you would just identify
your name and your publication. We don't have obviously time to
take questions from everyone here so I would appreciate your
cooperation in that.
MR. HUBBARD: Justin Hubbard from Computer World. Any OEM
partners yet for the new 15 millimeter drive?
MR. EDWARDS: We are currently working as far as showing and
working with the technology with all of the major suppliers of
notebook and laptop computers. At this time we are not prepared to
announce any firm agreements with any of those manufacturers.
That will be forthcoming in the future.
MR. TURWISE: Eric Turwise. On-line electronic publisher.
MR. GROLNICK: We are only taking questions from the members of
the press.
VOICE: I wanted to know when we might be able to see them in
stores?
MR. GROLNICK: I am sorry. We are only taking questions from
members of the press. Can you repeat the question?
VOICE: I would like to know when it is we might see the Zip out
actually in the market?
MR. GROLNICK: The 15 millimeter we expect to begin shipping that
in the first quarter of 1997. The first quarter of next year.
VOICE: Thank you.
VOICE: Have you announced a price yet?
MR. GROLNICK: We haven't announced price on the 15 millimeter
drive yet. Any other questions?
VOICE: Are you going to do a price reduction on the regular Zip as
the new equipment comes out?
MR. GROLNICK: We have said before that our vision is to
eventually bring the price down on the Zip drive, but we have no
announcements, no comments to make on that right now.
VOICE: What would be your maximum storage capability?
MR. GROLNICK: Are you talking about the 15 millimeter?
VOICE: Yes, the high-end drives. How much capacity will it be able
to hold?
MR. GROLNICK: Right now we are just announcing the 100-
megabyte capacity of the notebook product to be shipped in Q-1. We
are going to do a demonstration once the Q and A is over of the 15
millimeter drive to show you it working here on the screen. If there
are no other questions?
VOICE: What will be thex
MR. GROLNICK: Could you identify your publication?
VOICE: When will be the proper for nonpress questions?
MR. GROLNICK: This event is really for the press.
VOICE: Perhaps he could tell one of us what his question is and we
could ask you. What was your question?
VOICE: I am a Zip user. One problem is you are very, very slow on
Windows drives. We have had repeated questions with your people
and they said, well, it takes time and I said hey, don't you have
programmers? Zip drive is superb and I love it and I use it. I am not
bashing you. I am wondering why you have those problems.
MR. EDWARDS: We are running a business with priorities. NT is a
low priority.
VOICE: Computer World. Western Digital today announced a ten
and a half to be priced at $200.
MR. EDWARDS: I think it is a removable hard drive, is it not?
VOICE: Yes. Will that price point affect your product at all?
MR. EDWARDS: No.
VOICE: Do you have an upgrade to start moving up?
MR. EDWARDS: Yes, a one gigabyte hard drive for $499.
VOICE: Do you have a product that will --
MR. EDWARDS: We have 200 megabyte drives working in the R&D
laboratories and we have, on paper, our engineers can show you
how to take it up to 400 megabytes.
VOICE: Timetable?
Subj: q and a #2
Date: 96-06-18 21:24:22 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
MR. EDWARDS: That will be determined by consumer demand and
competitive reactions.
VOICE: Will it be shipping in the same time frame?
MR. GROLNICK: They will both be shipping in July.
MR. EDWARDS: With that, are we going to do the demo?
MR. GROLNICK: Yes. As with all alpha prototypes, we got this thing
working few a minutes ago. Actually that is not true. It was a couple
of days ago. So we had plenty of time to spare. I want to recognize a
couple members of the Zip engineering team. Two of the guys, Jeff
Draper here with the ponytail and Rick Levitt in the blue shirt over
there. They have been working really hard. We want to show you
today that it is more than just vapor that we are talking about. We
are going to demonstrate the 15 millimeter Zip drive working in a
Toshiba notebook. There is a lot of excitement around the show
surrounding notebooks. What we have done is totally redesign Zip
to meet the needs of notebook computers in terms of size, weight,
power management, all that. We will be announcing more details as
we get closer to the ship date.
So why don't we kick it off. One of the things as we get the monitor
going here, one of the things to be the next floppy, the floppy for the
multimedia age, it is important that you can actually run
multimedia. That would seem to make sense and when we designed
the original Zip drive, a critical part of that is being able to run basic
video files, we thought that was an important criteria to reach a
threshold. So that is what we are going to show you here in a
minute on the screen. This is a simple ADA file. You saw it running
off the Zip drive. It has our friendly Zip bezel there. You can
recognize it. We are going to show it in the both all day tomorrow
along with the battery and the PCMCIA card. We thank you for
coming.
Reported by:
Doyle Reporting, Inc.
Subj: iomega web news page
Date: 96-06-18 21:25:17 EDT
From: Cascadiasl
here is Iomega's web page for hot corporte news!
iomega.com./corporate/company/news.html
Subj: Read this News!!
Date: 96-06-18 21:38:59 EDT
From: FellerMike
Sorry for the headline, but we have to emphasize one thing that Kime Edwards
(CEO of Iomega) said at the press conference today:
>> Now, in the upcoming few weeks, we expect to make several
announcements that will totally eliminate any issues in terms of our
ability to supply the OEM buy-in to make Zip the standard for the
floppy of the multimedia age. Now, you think about this. <<
One of the last short arguments remaining is that Iomega is having trouble
getting production ramped up quickly enough to supply the OEM's. Looks like
that one will be out the window soon.
Regarding the LS-120:
As has been stated here ad nauseum, the LS-120 is a Compaq product. IBM,
Hewlett Packard, Packard Bell, Gateway, Dell, etc. are *not* going to adopt a
product that is made by a direct competitor. Period. End of story. No IBM
product manager is going to buy product from a company that is out to get as
much of IBM's market share as possible.
The LS-120 will have a niche, but has no chance of becoming a standard since
Compaq gets revenue from each one sold. It would be like IBM buying printers
from HP; they just will not do it, regardless of the 6 month migration
advantage of backward compatability.
While I'm at it, the backward compatability issue is relevant for about the
first 2 days you have your new computer. Once you get a Zip (mine's in the
new Hewlett Packard HP711Z), you tend not to use your old 1.44mg disks
anymore. Transfer the data once & you're done.
Just my thoughts.
Subj: Re:press conf transcript #2
Date: 96-06-18 21:58:25 EDT
From: Huibs pht
>>
Now, in the upcoming few weeks, we expect to make several announcements that
will totally eliminate any issues in terms of our ability to supply the OEM
buy-in to make Zip the standard
<<
..manufacturing partners..
..now THAT'S some great news!!..
<<
Ken |
