Greetings to all on this thread. I'd like to share my knowledge, research,
and feelings with all, in hopes of shedding a little light on a potentially great story.
Anyone could have obtained this same information as I with some
hard work and devotion to research. I have done an extensive amount
of homework and have traveled to Montreal for the shareholders meeting.
There I met all the principle; George Wickman (Board member of Sands),
Mr. Richie (President), Jerry Shattner (President, H.D.S.), Kevin Horagon
(new Marketing Representative) and several, if not all, of the program team
of the nucleus server. I was also fortunate to meet three members of the
Digital Equipment Corporation who were there to assist Sands with the
implementation of the nucleus on the Digital 64 bit processor. I saw
product from both companies and discussed at length the system and system
functions with both the Sands staff and the Digital representative. All
were very gracious and hospitable and did not hesitate in answering all of
my questions on the system itself.
We were then hosted by Mr. Richie, Kevin Horigan, Jerry Shattner,
and George Wickman, all of whom I would like to say Thank You for your
time and gracious hospitality. They took the time to answer all my questions
and did not make me feel that I was imposing at all.
I have waited to write and post this response until now for one very important
reason. When I was in Canada, one of the major hurtles I found the company
was experiencing was the dual thread. The product had received some
small notoriety and one major sale to General Canadian Tire for 1.6 million
(not all of which went to Sands). I personally believe they felt that with what the
nucleus server is capable of doing with the hugh amounts of data storage in terms of
retrieval time and reduced storage capacity, that the dual thread would
not be of paramount importance at this point in time. This turned out to be
an understatement by both Mr. Richie and H.D.S. The use of the multi-
thread is, I think, paramount to Sands success. The rumor is that it is not
only a dual thread code breakthrough, but also one of unlimited number of
customer user. The implications of this accomplishment are staggering.
Microsoft and the Internet come to mind. Afterall, Mr. Glaser developed
"nucleus" for personal computer use. It was Mr. Richie by his wisdom and
insight into corporate systems who decided to first target corporate users and then
(Isuspect) moved into the broader base of personal computing.
After Mr. Richie targets the Fortune 1000 companies, which is his first goal,
he can aggressively go after any and all licensing agreements that he can get.
I.M.H.O., Mr. Richie's game plan is to sell or lease at least 15-20 top
corporate clients and use them as a spring board for the server. He is very
adamant that H.D.S., a subsidiary of Hitachi, Inc. (at 79 billion per year corporation),
is quite capable and strongly intrenched in the corporate world. They will
provide Sands with all the necessary exposure needed to take hold of this
data, minimizing the market and making the nucleus the standard required
operating system of data management.
Following is a synopsis of H.D.S. prowess, both here and abroad:
Installed Base
Hitachi Data System has products installed in every industry sector of the
Fortune 1000, worldwide. H.D.S. customer include:
All of the top 10 - Fortune 500 Industrials
23 of the top 25 - Fortune 500 Industrials
62 of the top 100 - Fortune 500 Industrials
27 of the Fortune 100 Banking concerns, including
8 of the top 10
20 of the Fortune 100 Diversified Services firms,
including 5 of the top 10
21 of the Fortune 50 Utilities,
including 9 of the top 10
17 of the Fortune 50 Transportation companies,
including 8 of the top 10
15 of the Fortune 50 Life Insurance providers,
including 7 of the top 10
16 of the Fortune 50 Diversified Financial Service
companies, including 7 of the top 10
12 of the Fortune 50 Retail concerns,
including 6 of the top 10
6 of the Financial Times 10 largest companies in Europe
27 of the Financial Times 50 largest companies in Europe
51 of the Finanical Times 100 largest companies in Europe
My understanding is that approximately 28 sales members at H.D.S.
have been fully trained in all fazes of the running of and the implementation
of the server. The first priorities will be the U.S., Canada and Australia.
The window of opportunity is I.M.H.O. approzimately 2 1/2 to 3 years,
and that could be very optimistic once your Informex's, Oracles, Sybases, IBM's,
and Red Bricks start losing out to sales with Sands.
The competition will pour massive amounts of money into trying to break code,
or take the easy way, but not cheap way, out by licensing product. The
main disadvantage to Sands using H.D.S. is the loss of identity. If I had
spent 8 years of my life and 30 million dollars to develop this product, I would
hate to see someone else take credit. Unfortunately the phrase "here today,
gone tomorrow" applies to far too many good ideas that just didn't make it
or had to get the backing necessary to bring it to market. Hitachi was excited about
the product when it was a single thread. They and Ditigal must be estatic
now with the dual thread, plus the possible unlimite potential of the product
as now developed.
Mr. Richie stated, in May, that the company needed Digital for their 64
bit processor for the server runs at its optimum performance on 64 bit architeture.
Digital is not the power house they once were in the late 80's. They are
stronger over sees, and the U.S. Market is being taken over by Hewlitt Packer
Sun Microsystem, Oracle, and still I.B.M..
I definately see the nucleus software being customized to take advantage of
both corporations 64 bit architeture. There is very little left in main frame
market, when P.C., that are powered by the Pentiums and Pentium Pro's II
and later this year the 300 mghs Merced by Intel.
The amount of time to install prducts depends on size of corporation
and can take as little as 15 minutes. Operators can use immediately with very little
training.
The product is said to be full proof on and in all systems. I believe the
heat shield was probably a by-product of the nucleus development. This product
in as itself could be extremely valuable for Sand's.
In some of the extremely few and far between press releases, there was
a mention of several consecutive quarters of negative earnings. From what
I can determine from their financials, this has not happened. The company also saw
fit to dig in their war chest and buy back 10% of their stock and retired it.
That took 1.6 million off the table and H.D.S. left approximately 4 million on the table.
These are large numbers for such a small company. Something is definetly taking place,
all positive.
If there have been no more sales to any major corp. then the only source of new
revenue has to be coming from leasing the product.
the amounts of 25k to 50k per month per corp. has been tossed around from time to
time with no confirmation. IMHO I believe we are looking at between 5---15 companies maybe
more now with the dual code announcement stepping forward and anting up the big bucks.
We sure have some new higher priced salaries to deal with.
We also know that the Canadian National rail road was delighted with the productin it's
single thread form. Let's hope they have been able to turn this huge Canadian corp. into a sale
or a long term lease. Word of mouth advertising is just as important in big corporate America as it
is in the smaller private sector and is probably a major part of Mr. Richie's game plan.
So were do we go from here? Good question. Believing that we now have a vivable
product that corp. world will want and we have one of the best marketing arm's around to push it,
I believe it comes down to our own gut reaction at this particular point of the game. Once we are
generally available let's hope not only will it be aggressively marketed and news will be much more
forth coming than it has been in the past.
I have had a sizeable portion of my portfolio in SNDCF for 18 monthsnow and have been
quietly watching and listening to all developments during that time.
1998 and 1999 will I hope be great years for Sands. For by the year 2000 we probably won't be
the only bit vector datamining product out there. Time will be short.
I hope Mr. Richie will share good news often and will keep us posted on were the
company is going.
Good trading to all.
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