Here are my (not comprehensive) notes from the shareholders' meeting:
Marketshare: WIND's marketshare (I guess of COTS RTOS) is at 45%, grown rapidly from a recent 20%. EETimes has a table which shows WIND at 52%, also showing that only WIND and QNX (much smaller) have been growing their marketshare.
Market dynamics: There are new market dynamics which have caused WIND to pursue solutions (see below) and increased consulting. There is a larger base of companies than in the past seeking to build embedded systems, and many WIND customers have less software expertise than previous engineering-heavy companies. Jerry calls this the mass market for embedded systems, saying that sometimes a company defines a product and hasn't yet even hired its first engineer.
Acquisitions: WIND plans to continue strategic acquisitions.
Consulting: WIND wants to meet the needs of customers, including consulting or completely designing the product for them. To be able to ramp up sufficiently without outrageous hiring, WIND works with partners, "certified software solutions providers" which work under WIND project management to do the work for the customer. Ron mentioned that one risk is the increased dependence on these partners.
CEO: Ron said farewell, and was thanked and wished well in comments by shareholders. Jerry commented on the CEO search saying it was going well, but that he wouldn't comment further until they have found and signed the right person.
Market segments: Geographic breakdown is 65% US, 20% Europe and 15% Asia (or 15/20 Europe/Asia - Jerry raced through his presentation...). Telecom/mil.-aero/....(a blur); consumer segment is only 10% but "growing very very quickly." Internet described in 3 parts, servers/infrastructure/appliances with WIND in all 3, and the growth now in the appliances. Jerry mentioned interest in the "last mile" part of the infrastructure.
Competitors: INTS grew only 3% last quarter, MWAR is shrinking. MSFT is a competitor (and Ron also mentioned SUN as a competitor), but Jerry discussed some competitive advantages of WIND (its reputation for reliability; that the customer can put its imprint on the product, not sharing the visibility with MSFT...).
Design wins: Jerry couldn't name names, but showed a slide of about 21 vendors of car navigation systems, which stated WIND is in 55% of them. Another slide showed printer vendors, with 68% WIND inside. Specific design wins were listed (but I blinked!) for digital cameras, cable modems, Intelligent RAID (99% WIND inside), Intelligent LAN (99% WIND inside), screenphones, gaming (e.g. lotto terminals) and Java, and Jerry said that WIND has "probably more than half the design wins for JAVA" [in the embedded market]. Also mentioned I2O, NGIO and Future IO. Jerry said I2O will "do nicely". There have been "thousands of successfully deployed applications" using VxWorks.
Solutions: Jerry described the new focus on providing solutions, which refers to design wins where WIND supplies 100% of the software for the customer's end product. Example of a direct solution (in which WIND does the whole thing) was Tornado for Managed Switches. Examples of indirect solutions (working with a partner) were Tornado for Digital TV (with Liberate, e.g. for AOL TV) and Tornado for Cable Modems (with CISCO).
GRAD program mentioned.
Much much more I missed, maybe some I got wrong...disclaimer disclaimer disclaimer.
Got a tour of the campus. Fabulous place, 2 buildings fully occupied by about 350, 3 more planned, to swell to 1200 people. Right on the water with great view of the marina, downtown Oakland, and the Oakland harbor.
[Long on WIND for the foreseeable future.]
-David
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