Telegate apparently has used Shlomo's S-CDMA to develop VoiP over cable. Terayon apparently hadn't done that. Now we can expect they will offer it. Sorry I can't provide you with the technical guts of Telegates Voip, but barring the notion that Telegate's avowed technology doesn't really exist, Mr. Gilder makes perfect sense.
Once again I need your help. You have to understand I have an enormous respect for words and when they're used to mislead, I get rather, how should I say it --- intense?
So help me out. When you say, "barring the notion that Telegate's avowed technology doesn't really exist, Mr. Gilder makes perfect sense," what exactly are you saying? Did Mr. Gilder indicate Telegate's avowed technology doesn't exist? I still don't have the full report (I will as soon as my daughter gets off my AOL account :)) so I only have what's published on Terayon's website. There it seems clear he's indicating Telegate would solve Rogers' needs. And by "avowed technology" what do you mean? Who's avowal? Are you covering your own ass or someone else's? I've been told there's no there there, but now I'm getting the impression you may be in agreement. (Leading one to wonder if a good SEC attorney shouldn't look at the purchase agreement between the two brothers.)
At any rate, I think I'm to assume Telegate may have VoIP over S-CDMA at some point in the future. And since Rogers' George Hart is on the DOCSIS committee, it's probably not too much a stretch to say if TERN's VoIP is to be used, it'll happen after they've received DOCSIS certification. Would you agree this is a fair assumption? In short, Terayon's VoIP hopes lie with Telegate and should they (Telegate) get their products certified by CableLabs, Terayon stands a good chance of getting some of Rogers' business? If any part of my assumption is incorrect, please tell me.
Okay, to my question about your numbers for Imedia's products ". . .Cherrypicker is already beyond the initial development stage, it's in use and helping to cause Tern's revenues to soar, and their pro-forma profits to become .04 last Q vs an expected pro-forma loss of $.19.. . .""
You've now responded:
My mistake...I presumed to assume that Cherrypicker is a boon to Terayon's business, when in fact, I know nothing of the kind for a fact. I do know I've added nothing you might not already have seen. The earnings report indicates that Terayons modem sales for the 4th quarter were 113,000 modem sold, headends sold numbered 400..I forget the percentages, but I believe the incease in modems sold in the 4th Q compared to the 3rd Q significantly helps account for the 62% sequential revenue growth.
Have you ever heard the term, you can't ring the bell backwards? That means you can't take back what's said or done. In this instance, either your earlier post was untrue or your disclaimer is untrue. You can't have it both ways. And either way you've lost your credibility. If you now want me to believe the improved numbers came from modem and head-end sales, you must take me for a fool. How on earth could sales of legacy products suddenly make up for an expected loss of .19 an expectation based on legacy products? And, yes, you did add to my knowledge. Before your post I had no idea CherryPicker had brought in such good numbers. I was curious, as was every analyst on the call. And your revelation was, indeed, what many expected but had no way of verifying since Rakib refused to pull out numbers either on product mix, geography or vendor.
Continuing on, I wrote: "...it's clear Rogers wants a VoIP solution and that Terayon's current products aren't meeting those requirements."
And you responded:
If they did already meet those requirements, why would there be an agreement to develop anything? There is a development agreement which remains, so what?
First of all, the agreement was with Terayon (not Telegate), and was struck last March and ends one year later. From the S-3:
On March 18, 1999, we entered into a Supply Agreement with Rogers Cablevision Limited ("Rogers Cablevision"), a subsidiary of Rogers Communications. Under the Supply Agreement, we agreed to make available to Rogers Cablevision our current TeraLink Gateway and TeraLink 1000 Master Controller, and TeraPro Cable Modems and specified software. We also committed to certain product pricing and specifications. Under the terms of the Supply Agreement, Rogers retains the right to return to us all product purchased until we meet certain conditions. Accordingly, we do notrecognize revenue on shipments to Rogers until the milestones have been achieved or Rogers has waived the right to return the product. For the three and nine months ended September 30, 1999, Rogers waived their right to return certain product purchased and we recognized approximately $5.0 million in revenues from sales to Rogers. There is no guarantee that we will be able to achieve the condition specified in the Supply Agreement or obtain waivers from Rogers in future quarters. . . .
The Development Agreement has a term of one year. . .
Will Telegate/Terayon meet Rogers' requirements within the next 3 1/2 weeks? Is there likely to be a second agreement? What would Rogers stand to gain? Would they be able to pull the warrant game again? Or would eyebrows be raised as to what, exactly, was being exchanged?
Further on, I said: "Current specifications do not include Terayon's S-CDMA. So, yes, Terayon has, indeed, been thrown out of current specs."
And you replied:
S-CDMA was never in current specs- never- at any point in time, hence can't be said to have been thrown out. The invitation to Terayon remains.
Okay, I think we can agree 1) they've never been in DOCSIS specs, 2) they're not in current specs, and 3) they have an opportunity to be included in a future specification which as yet has no name and no date. When referring to current specifications, I will refrain from using the term "thrown out," and use "not included," instead. The latter has the door slamming more quietly.
As for your link to CoxExpress, it's been pointed out that the modems in question are not S-CDMA and that, in fact, an entire channel on a Terayon system is not even capable of the 2-way specs called out in CoxExpress's link to FAQs --- specs you not-so-incidentally left out:
How fast is Cox Express?
Cox Express is capable of reaching speeds up to 30 times the speed of a standard telephone modem (technically speaking, Cox Express has up to 1000K downstream and an upstream bandwidth of 128k). At such speeds, even multi-megabyte program files can download from a Web server to your hard drive in a matter of seconds.
You go on to write:
"After extensive testing of various modem options on the market, Shaw found that it could certify its plants to the upstream signal-to-noise ratio of 25 dB for deployment of Terayon modems ? a full 10 dB below the certification standard for the TDMA modems (Figure 2). This meant that, rather than waiting for a system to be fully upgraded, Shaw could introduce high-speed data service over systems where fiber linked the primary distribution hubs but did not extend out to the secondary node level. As a result, Shaw is now offering high-speed data services using S-CDMA-based systems over two-way, upgraded HFC with node sizes of up to 12,000 homes passed without installing return-path filters. Thus, the company has been able to meet its goal of rolling out data services aggressively without having to accelerate its capital-spending plan."
Could you please respond to the following comment from a friend in the industry:
"They're adding up multiple headends across a large geographic area to get those numbers. . . . The fact remains TERN systems have a HARD LIMIT of 128 simultaneous users/channels. That is the absolute most under ideal conditions. DOCSIS deployments have no such limit."
Is there anything there you would care to refute?
I don't even know why I'm asking. Anyone who would give false information on something as critical as earnings' figures certainly can't be trusted to be honest about anything else.
But after Terayon's DOCSIS headlines last fall, and Rakib's blatant lying on national TV, and, now, Gilder's less-than-honest report posted on their website as if his words were true, I shouldn't be surprised.
Pat |
