Hey M,
The best board I know for info on Aden is at Raging Bull.
There are some reasons for optimism IMO.
Aden has hired Ruder Finn to handle public relations, there must be some news coming if they need to hire a pretty decent PR firm.
Aden has already licensed their technology to Budget, see bidbudget.com. I'm only speculating because I have not talked to anyone at Aden for a while, but I think they will be able to get more companies to license Aden's technology, using their own brands using a Priceline style bid system, a la bidbudget. The market for this is potentially huge, who needs Priceline when individual companies can sell their own excess inventory and promote their brands at the same time. See PR released by Aden about extending agreement with MercExchange for more on this.
The fact that ADEN was able to license the technology without a peep from Priceline tells me that there might actually be some merit to their case against PCLN, though I think the disposition of the case is far off and Aden will have to make it on it's own merits in the short term.
The list of possible clients for this technology is huge. Car rental companies, hotels, airlines, and they don't need to limit themselves to travel. In my opinion, it is a better strategy than Priceline's. (Woolston was on the cover of Interactive Week last week talking about the case and the technology.)
I'm also waiting for Aden to improve their websites (let's face it, they suck right now) and from what I understand that's what the large brains in Russia are working on, in exchange for a piece of the company. However, that Russia angle might be a ruse for all I know, certainly sounds a little dodgy. Then again, getting a bunch of highly motivated, intelligent Russians to work cheap could be a great idea. I need to call Aden and ask for more info on the Russia angle.
I'm also pretty sure that Mike Luther had a nice piece of Homestore.com, which already went public and is doing quite well. Hopefully Mike will poor those HOMS profits into making Aden a similar success. In any case, Aden's management seems solid with Woolston, Dozono, Luther and the guy who helped start Ameritrade. At least they have documented internet success, and from all accounts are extremely motivated to succeed.
All this is set against the fact that Aden has a huge amount of shares outstanding, but if the PCLN suit truly has merit, and ADEN continues to find good clients to whom they can license their technology, I think we can go significantly higher. I'm holding out for a market cap of 1 billion which would put Aden around $3 or $4, this will take time.
When you are trying for a ten bagger, risk is extremely high, only invest in Aden with risk capital, stocks trade under a dollar for a reason, and only a small percentage of pennies make it big, let's hope Aden is one of them.
Hope that helps. |
