Greetings All:
A few random thoughts:
(1) AOL - I don't invest in AOL, but I am a subscriber. I have been for a year and a half. I have finally got disgusted with it and got an additional ISP. I need reliabilty and any ISP can be down at any time. It is better 2 have 2 ISP's when trading stocks over the internet. My new provider's web service is much faster. I probably won't ever access the web again via AOL, except in emergencies. From an investment standpoint, it may very well tank. However, from a business standpoint, it has a lot going for it:
(a) Controllability for parents. Basically, AOL is G-rated. Parents know they can leave their kids alone with AOL.
(b) Free web space for business customers. All my other local ISP providers either must pre-approve each web page or they charge for business web pages, even if you only sell $20/month.
(c) A whole lot of its own forums and features. Remember getting onto the web is still very technical for most people.
(d) Multiple ID's on one account. Local ISP's only have 1 ID per account and families like having multiple ID's with varied parental controls.
(2) The death of the floppy. I wouldn't be too hasty about this. Remember, over 1/2 of homes have no computer. But, typewriters are gone (mostly). These people use other people's computers to write on. They store their text files on floppies. This includes millions of college students and high school students who use the hundreds of thousands of school computer labs available.
Also, remember what happened when the 3 1/2 replaced the 5 1/4, new commercial programs stopped being available on 5 1/4 and were available on 3 1/2. This hasn't happened. New programs are available on 3 1/2 and cdrom. The zip is "only" a storage device.
(3) Competition. There seems to be an attitude that only one portable storage company can survive. This seems silly in light that there are multiple computer manufactorers, multiple disk drive manufactorers, etc. The desire and market for large portable storage outstrips supply. If there is a desire for 2 million units a month and zip can only make 1 million a month and we sell all of our product, it shouldn't matter what anyone else does. Now, in the long run, I am sure that will mean lost sales. But, in the next 2-3 years, it shouldn't matter. As long as we sell our whole production each month, I don't care if Syquest sells 50,000/month. Afterall, has the growth in sales of IBM compatible computers been that hurt by the continuing manufacture of Apple computers?
4. (Marketing) Marketing is the key. We have proven winners in the IOM management. With increasing sales and increasing revenues, the stock will be fine. In fact, every other headline the last couple of days seem to mention decreased earnings. I am confident IOM will blow their estmate out of the water. And, just like we have gone down to our long term support level, we will rise back up to our long term resistence level.
IOM reminds me of "The Litle Engine That Could." Despite the hill of naysayers, stockmarket professional's disrespect, constant competition, etc., IOM keeps chugging along, saying, "I think I can. I think I can."
Mike |
