[Company notes]
Steve --
I phoned Spectrum this afternoon and had a long chat with the CEO and while I may have misunderstood some of his explanations, I think I grasped the overall concepts. Then again, maybe I didn't. :) This is what I think I heard:
* the V.34+ is being ported to the C6X, making it able to peel potatoes, shine shoes, and play Beethoven's Fifth simultaneously --- all while taking up less space and using less energy than its competitors.
* they'll design around 56K when His Holiness Pope ITU decides which standard to bless.
* they'll stay on DSL sidelines until the elephants stop stepping on each other's feet --- estimated to be another six months.
* "PRISM" --- a sophisticated O/S for DSPs --- arrived on a bagpipe via 3L and facilitates low cost/high volume applications. NEC was first customer and used it for audio technology. Now adapted, it's being put together for multi-processing systems.
* Hurricane chip is the UN secretary general of DSP PCIs --- while improving performance and density, it allows all DSPs to speak to each other. It unclogs the data bottleneck and eventually will be licensed. spectrumsignal.com
* any significant DSP software revenues will come in Q2'98 and beyond.
* end users are OEMs --- if Adam had been an OEM he would have gone to God (SSPIF) and explained he was lonely and needed a mate. God would have asked for a little more guidance --- size, age, looks, personality --- and then gone to his chipmaker for a handful of dust (or rib, depending on which myth you believe) and proceeded to create the desired woman. Like Adam, most OEMs know what they want but don't have the DSP expertise in-house to design it.
* they're talking to companies who do DSL chips --- this is transport layer --- the board level products like V.34 can differentiate. Primary market is Remote Access Servers, not ISPs.
* some products require mix-and-match approach --- V.34 plus voice recognition, for example. You want a 5'6" red-head with blue eyes and outgoing personality, you got it.
* abbra-cadabbra approach to software upgrades allows products to switch markets --- some that were developed for James Bond can be tweaked and sold to Biffy and Buff at the local mall. Digital radios, for example, began in the military and are now commercial.
ú margins will range from 75% to 40% depending on quantity.
Okay, standing back and looking at the company from a distance, I'm most impressed with their ability to put multiple modems on a chip, with their Hurricane chip for the PCI interface, and their technology that allows software to change a DSP-based product's functions. Apart from their products, I'm impressed with the partnership they've forged with TI and feel this is a key to their position in the DSP sector. I'm hoping they're the source of TI's multiple-modem expertise, but I have no way of knowing if this is the case.
I welcome any corrections. The DSP field requires a new vocabulary and I'm just beginning.
BTW, I'm still getting over the shock of being in a company with real earnings. If this is a dream, don't wake me up.
Cheers!
Pat |
