This came today:
Letter to Shareholders:
July 28, 2000
Dear Shareholder,
The burst.com management team would like to thank you for your continued interest in and support of the
company. We strive to keep our investors abreast of important company news and will be mailing you periodic
updates such as this in order to keep you well informed.
2000 has already been an eventful year for the company and there are a number of additional initiatives currently
underway that will be announced shortly. Some of the highlights thus far in 2000 include:
The Clearance of SEC Form 10 Comments
burst.com was notified on July 26 that the SEC had no further comment on its registration statement, which
became effective January 11, 2000. Our trading symbol also reverted to "IVDO" from "IVDOE" in connection
with this clearance. We will now focus attention on the application for listing on the NASDAQ SmallCap Market.
The Closure of a $19 Million Financing Round
burst.com's January financing round involved several major institutional investors, including New York-based
Special Situations Fund, L.P., Chelsey Capital, Ravinia Capital Ventures, LLC, and BayStar Capital L.P. of San
Francisco. The round comprised of approximately $14 million in cash and the conversion of outstanding notes
totaling $5.3 million.
The Release of Version 2.0 of Burstware®
Version 2.0 of Burstware®, burst.com's patented video and audio delivery software, was released in May. The
new features include a Burst-Enabled QuickTime Player (QTP) for Windows, an Enhanced Narrowband Viewing
feature, and a plugable Access Control Interface. Companies deploying Burstware 2.0 will be able to use this
interface to implement policies that enable pay-per-view programming, subscription-based access to content, and
corporate access levels. We believe these features are an important step toward making Internet VOD a viable
and successful business model.
The Appointment of a New President
We are thrilled to announce that Douglas Glen has joined the burst.com management team. Doug has a
distinguished career in the high-tech and entertainment industries. His career highlights include positions at Mattel
Inc., Sega, and Lucasfilm. He was Senior Vice President, Chief Strategy officer of Mattel, responsible for the toy
company's technology initiatives. Doug started Mattel Media, which pioneered entertainment software for girls,
and IntelPlay, a high-tech toy venture with Intel Corp. At Sega of America, Doug was group Vice President,
Business Development and Strategic Planning, and he was responsible for the launch of Sega's multimedia video
game line.
The Launch of a Hosting Service for Rich-Media Web Content
Burst Hosting Service is a new strategic business unit for the company that creates a win-win situation for both the
company and its clients. The service provides hosting for premium quality multimedia content, which is linked to
clients' websites. The company currently operates a network of seven data centers. Burst Hosting Service deploys
burst.com's Faster-Than-Real-Time™ technology to deliver high-quality, reliable media content to clients'
websites without requiring them to invest in costly network infrastructure. The Burst Hosting Service infrastructure
was recently deployed to host burst.com's own VOD premier of U2's PopMart Concert. (See below)
The Appointment Of a New CFO
John C. Lukrich was appointed as our Chief Financial Officer in June. John has significant experience in senior
management roles in start-ups, business-to-business and Internet-related companies. Most recently John served
as interim Director for RateXchange.com and as a part of the senior management team for San Francisco-based
NetAmerica.com (NAMI), an incubator for Internet business-to-business startups.
The Demonstration of Our Technology Through An Internet VOD Premier of U2's PopMart Concert
We were excited by the response to our premier of U2's PopMart concert that ran from June 8 through June 29.
This special event generated more than 500,000 hits on the U2.burst.com website. Many visitors to the site wrote
to burst.com commending the quality and reliability of the viewing experience. The event generated much press
and TV airtime, having been covered by USA Today, Newsday, New York Daily News, Washington Post, The
Hollywood Reporter, all major TV networks, and many other print and online publications. The concert was a
landmark opportunity for burst.com to demonstrate its technology as the future of TV-quality video over
broadband networks. burst.com looks forward to providing more unique and exciting Internet events in future.
We hope that you find these milestones as exciting as we do. This year promises to be our most eventful year
ever, and be assured we will keep you informed of all major announcements as they happen. If you have any
questions or comments, please contact us at (415) 391-4455.
Best regards,
Richard Lang
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
P.S. For additional information about any of the events listed above, please visit our website at
burst.com. |
