A stimulating posting on Raging Bull:
ragingbull.com
By: Intentional
Reply To: 7965 by S_Type_Jag Tuesday, 25 Apr 2000 at 7:10 PM EDT
Post # of 8007
Jag: Netp suffers a perception problem. For one thing, it's not a Silicon Valley company. I think this is a good thing in many ways, but it means that there's not a lot of awareness of it in the Valley. That's where a lot of perceptions begin. I wish Netp had an R&D outlet there.
Second, it doesn't have enough well-known glamorous customers. It has a few, but a lot of its customers are stodgy old retailers that have been around for years. EPNY has MSFT, AMZN, AMEX, and American Airlines as customers. They're targeting the Fortune 1000. Netp isn't really in a position to target corporations across the board: only some are appropriate customers for its products. I wish they could get Amazon back in the fold. Start doing more testimonials (the $50M lift for JC Penney should be ADVERTISED! The Nightline Demo about GUS should be mailed to every large retailer in the US. There should be some full page ads in The Industry Standard, Wired, Business 2.0, The Economist, Sci America, Red Herring, the New Yorker, go ahead, pick some!)
Third, Netp doesn't have much end-user presence or retail presence, so the company is largely unknown to the public. Even those who know about it have trouble explaining the company to others; I know I do. Really, Netp is specializing in real-time industrial retail solutions. You can't go out and buy a Netp. And you can't see a recommendation engine. I'd personally be very gung ## if Netp were to enter the consumer space in a limited way, if only so that they could get their name out there. I've mentioned before that I don't think the name helps, since I think the word "Net" implies a generation of companies that are now about 10 yrs out of date. But the name is only what you make of it, and Netp doesn't have much of a brand to promote at the moment, at least in the consumer space.
Fourth, Netp simply doesn't do much of any PR. Sure they do the summit, and they put out an occasional press release, but if the company doesn't make an effort to have its voice heard, everyone will ignore it. The logic for buying this company is so financially sane, it's scary. On the other hand, few people are even looking at Netp.
Fifth, the company needs someone other than Snyder to represent the company to the Press and the Media as a nearly full-time job. I think that's an awful lot of what Siboni does. Snyder is more a Strategic & Operations guy. Netp needs someone to complement him who is good at schmoozing and developing relationships at the CEO/upper mgmt level with customers and allies.
Sixth, the company needs a really big quarter. While it's great that Netp has maintained 50% quarter-to-quarter growth, EPNY has been doing 60% q-to-q. So while Netp's revenue growth is very, very good, it's business model has not yet kicked in to produce what I'd call break-away results. I think this is a real possibility down the road as the company ramps up its sales force and continues to expand the breadth of its product offerings, and its international reach. It just didn't happen this quarter.
Seventh, there are several key alliances that would be huge, huge wins. Without stating the nature of any of these, the ones I believe could have huge potential are with Oracle, Microsoft, Amazon, Microstrategy, Yahoo, and Infospace. I completely ignore the B2B space because I don't yet understand how Netp contributes there.
Eighth, Netp intends to be the leader in Personalization, but I don't think this can be done without offering a product that deals with the individual user. If netp simply sells to retailers, then it's Personalization message and leadership is really "Finely Targeted Marketing." As I heard someone say once, "Where's the customer in customization?" By the same token "Where's the person in personalization?" The point here is that Netp is looking at Personalization less than personally. Their products are for corporations, not people. That's okay, if that's the business you're in. But to be the leader in personalization means a whole lot more to me than doing the sorts of products that Netp does. It implies to me that Netp do products for the person too.
Ninth, and then I'll shut up, Netp needs to become the friend of its investors, including little guys like us. I don't blame Netp for the crash or the huge drop in their share price. The Gods of the Nasdaq made it happen. Still, a lot of individual investors on this board bought the company in good faith, albeit on margin, and have lost a lot of money investing in Netp. These were all people who believed in the future of the company, but now have a sour taste in their mouth about it because of the crash in the stock price. The retail investor in Netp at the moment is practically non-existent, except for shorts and day traders and momentum investors, all of whom don't care a whit about the company. Netp needs to make a concerted effort to first, simply acknowledge the existence of these individual investors. There SHOULD be thousands of them who believe strongly in the company. Instead, I feel like there are about 20 of us.
Oops, not shutting up yet. one more. Ten. We need analysts who REALLY analyze the stock. I'm tired of analysts who have analyze about other thirty stocks superficially, but don't really understand Netp's product line (not that I do either, but I'm not an analyst!) Also, I'm sick of having only the underwriters of the IPO and SPO provide analysts for Netp. The group is getting inbred.
Anyway, give me a blowout revenue growth quarter of 60%-80% and then I think Netp flies. I'm so sick of listening to all the noise about the Nasdaq and etailers and .coms and inflated valuations. It has virtually no relevance to Netp, yet that's what brought us down. Kind of hard to take. Kind of like getting shot in a drive-by shooting. Of course I've gotta admit we probably had a lot of us investors on margin. But that shouldn't be a crime, any more than borrowing to buy a house should be a crime.
Netp to the Moon, and then to Mars...!
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