In post #500 I noted a commentary from www.stockformation.com that quoted Tony Castagno, COO of USVO, as saying "We have a conference coming up at the North American Broadcasting Association on Friday and this will be the first time that network TV will be broadcast by satellite through Internet at extremely high quality levels. It will be just like watching TV through the Internet."
Hopefully there will be a press release shortly regarding the NABA conference. There might be something on other boards, like Raging Bull, but I am reluctant to go there because it is more like a chat room. Too many useless messages to sift through.
I had forgotten about the 17 Feb 00 press release but now recall it.
To digress a moment, USVO and Inet developed the broadband delivery system that was to be unveiled at the NABA conference. As far as I can determine, USVO outsources everything. From their recent Form 10 registration, they noted the patent on SFV VoD technology expired due to an administrative oversight. The request for reinstatement was denied in 1999 by the U.S. Patent Office. They have appealed the denial.
Excerpts from Form 10 filed with the SEC recently...
'Prior to 1999, the Company conducted seven years of research and development of its compression VoD technology.'
'The Company spent the following amounts in the past three years on research and development.
1997 1998 1999
-----------------------------------------------
$2,668 $24,000 $90,966'
'The Company controls multiple patents in the critical path to exploiting VoD technology and developing VoD systems. Ownership of these patents brings value to the Company but the patents are not critical to the current development of business.'
'The Company applied for an exclusive U.S. patent for its SFV VoD technology on February 1, 1990. The Company was granted U.S. Patent # 5,130,792 on July 14,1992.'
'In 1999, the U.S. Patent Office declined a request to reinstate this patent, which had expired because of an administrative oversight that led to late payment of fees in 1995. The Company has further investigated reasons for
this administrative oversight and determined that additional factors beyond its control were present; the Company has appealed the denial of the patent reinstatement and has reason to believe the matter will be resolved in favor of the Company.'
End of excerpts.
My point is the R&D was 7 years prior to 1999. The patent above was applied for in 1990 and approved in 1992 which was before R&D began. I find this very confusing but hope it is only paranoia on my part.
I own 10,000 shares bot at $.86 a share on 28 Dec 99 and still hold all of them but I would feel better if there was something of substance from the company in the next few weeks. I find the patent issue mentioned in Form 10 disturbing. Let's hope I am overreacting as a result of sitting on a healthy gain but greedy enough to want it to go higher. EOM |
