Well Mike, I'm afraid to say that worries about Q's ability to get healthy margins from its handset business were the second major issue strongly re-ignited by the Thurs pm conf. call. (Q's prior prediction of strengthening margins were strongly depended or moves to a higher end product mix...which now appears a quarter or more delayed.)
Far from being a silly past "worry du jour" such handset margin worries are justified and go centrally to whether Q emerges as a stable and ever expanding communications equipment powerhouse, or turns out to be technically brilliant flameout (like so many others). My strong belief is in the former, but margins on handsets are a, no probably THE, central longer term issue.
As it is right now, the entire Q is funded by royalties, the no growth cash cow Omnitracks, and fat margined asic sales ----formerly mostly to Koreans. Everything else looses a lot (infrastructure) or a little (handset sales) money; and all the overhead, including fat R&D also rests on the broad (but now considerably diminished) shoulders of the first three.
While Globalstar groundstation buildouts over the next year or two will probably turn out to be a decently profitable business after the first few, future greatness depends on handset profits (including handsets for Globalstar) ....and then a turn towards infrastructure profits.
Doug
PS I've heard you mention a couple of times that the handset business for LU was so lousy that they decided to get rid of it. That was wireline handset me boy...where everyone and his brother in E.Asia has an el cheapo entry. Nothing to do with the wireless handset business, which is Very important to Nokia, Ericcson, Motorola, et. al. |
