RE: Shareholders' Meeting Report!
I just got home from the shareholders' meeting. It was awesome! I'm really exhausted, though. I'll be posting this, and then I'm going straight to bed.
I still haven't had time to catch up on the thread since I went on my vacation last month. I'm going to just have to skip a couple thousand messages...
Most of the material covered was stuff that was previously covered, but there were a few tidbits that I picked up:
* Problems in Europe in Q1 appear to have been due to channel rebates being discontinued and Jaz2 not hitting the European market until Q2. Jaz2 is now in the market, and the channel rebates have been reinstituted.
* Jaz passed 1.5 million units in February (date wasn't given before).
* Iomega plans to return to profitability by the end of the year "if not sooner".
* Growing Iomega to become a $10 billion company was mentioned again, this time through more official channels (both Jim Sierk and David Dunn). They seem to be putting the infrastructure in place to support such growth.
* Guidance going forward: 15-20% SG&A, 3-5% R&D, 24-32% GM.
* 17 million personal solutions (Zip, Jaz, Ditto) shipped.
* Zip and Jaz breakdown will be given on an ongoing basis. I have the quarterly numbers for 1997 that I'll post later.
* Iomega is committed to making Zip the replacement for the floppy drive.
* Iomega is working to drastically reduce the cost of the Jaz 1GB drive and to set up OEM relationships for Jaz.
* More than 900 Clik prototypes have been produced, and "hundreds" (probably 100-150) have been shipped to potential OEM's.
* Good results from a customer satisfaction survey. Took second in customer satisfaction (behind HP), tied for first for perceived quality, and took first for customer loyalty.
* David Dunn admitted that the split was a mistake.
* Zip OEM penetration is expected to accelerate over the next several quarters.
* I got tons of Iomega buttons!
* I almost got an internal Clik drive (MAN, THEY'RE SMALL! THEY FIT RIGHT IN YOUR POCKET!), but they made me put it back. ;)
For those who weren't able to attend, you missed an awesome opportunity! I'm definitely going back next year! And I'm going to spend more than 24 hours in Utah next year, too.
- Michael Coley
- wwol.com |
