Report from Atlanta N+I: Interview with Jim Bender
First, I would like to thank Jim for being kind and gracious enough to
spend a considerable amount of time answering these questions from the SI
newsgroup (scrapps, R. Hooriani, srvhap, Steve Morytko). He also said that
he regularly reads the comments in SI and is familiar with the names of
several of the regular posters.
I am paraphrasing his comments as best as I can remember them and
everything was off-the-record. I have attempted to transcribe this as
accurately as possible, but it is inevitable that some personal
interpretation will occur. I hope that I have captured the essence of his
comments.
Cisco:
The Cisco deal was announced as quickly as it was, because we were
concerned that word was beginning to leak. Many people may have thought
that Aware announced when it did to help offset the news of the loss
associated with the quarterly report. Actually, it was just the opposite.
We were concerned that word of the Cisco licensing agreement was leaking
and would drive the stock price up, and that the price would quickly fall
on the news of the quarterly report loss. Catching many small investors in
a whiplash, so the decision was made to publicly release the Cisco news
immediately, even if the news release was scant.
There will be future releases detailing the Cisco licensing deal, but I
can't discuss that right now.
ADSL Industry:
ADSL is going to be a huge market with lots of players. No one company is
going to be able to dominate this market and Aware's sales strategy is to
build relationships with the major players. Quietly building strong
long-term business relationships with the other major players is not as
exciting from a PR standpoint, but we believe that it is the best way for
Aware to participate in the ADSL market.
Field Trials:
Aware has participated in all of the necessary important field trials.
These field trials were sufficient to provide the telecomm and networking
companies with the technical information that they require. Most of the
other field trials are done only for the purpose of press releases and
wouldn't be an appropriate use of Aware's money. Aware doesn't need to be
providing free ADSL equipment to Bill Gates and Microsoft (AMTX is
providing equipment to Microsoft for its trials). Microsoft, incidentally,
is very aware of the capabilities of every major ADSL player.
Selling in the ADSL market:
There is a curious parallel between selling to the telcomm market and
selling in a supermarket. There is a fixed amount of shelf space in both
markets and it is very difficult to get your product on the supermarket or
central office shelf. It is much easier for a "Proctor & Gamble" to
introduce a new product then for a startup. They can simply squeeze the
new product between their Fab and Wisk products, instead of having to push
another product off. This is why we are allied with the Ciscos, Ericssons
and DSCs of the industry instead of attempting to go it alone.
ADI/Amati licensing agreement:
ADI shared plans for the licensing agreement
with us . They felt that the price was so cheap, that they had
to make the licensing agreement. It was cheap insurance against any future
possible legal problems with Amati. All of the other points in the
agreement were relatively meaningless.
X200 ADSL Router:
We are very proud of the new Aware X200 ADSL Router (there were 3 of them
on display). It provides 50 times the performance of ISDN-based
remote-access equipment and it is the first ANSI-compliant ADSL access
router. In addition, we spent a lot to provide it with an attractive
molded-plastic form-factor. The X200 isn't just a demo prototype, but is a
finished commercial product ready for volume shipment.
Discussions with other vendors:
Efficient Networks
Talked with the Product Manager of the SpeedStream 5010 Modem, and asked
him "Why they choose the ADI/Aware chipset over the Motorola or TI chips".
He responded "Man, we would be in a world of hurt right now if we had
selected the Motorola chip". Asked him if the chip was difficult to program
or if he foresaw any problems down the road, "No, we have been really happy
with it". |
