Surely there are some sales types here....and among those there may have been a few raised eyebrows about "how easy it is to sell"...etc. which Novice Bob attributed to Scott Cameron.
No such thing! New is NEVER an easy sell. If it were, this company's list of clients would be much longer, and you guys wouldn't be waiting daily for the next announcement just around the corner.
Today, I personally made 20 calls to IR departments of companies I know...some big, some small, some in the middle. I explained who I was, that I wanted to speak to the IR director if possible, and that I wanted to learn if, as a company, a service such as that offered by TSIS would be of interest.
I got eleven of them on the line, and not one would be a buyer. The most telling call was to CPQ...where I learned that annually, about the time the year ends and new budgets are structured, they get between 5 and 10 proposals just like the one I described from TSIS. CPQ added that, since the program is so inexpensive to establish, "Why buy it through a middleman." (Do any of you recall my query on the thread some weeks back about the low barrier to entry?)
Indeed, CPQ has installed it's own system, and it does exactly what TSIS offers. CPQ retains control, and spends less. They use it to reach remote offices, for training, for internal product updates ...all the things TSIS's two systems provide. They also use it to provide meetings.
I asked about competitors. The Wall Street Journal now offers a similar service...as mentioned by two of my contacts, CPQ among them.
There may be some small money made here, but nothing major. This little company clearly doesn't have the cash stash to make a major splash. When I got my investor packet (April 9), there were no financials, not even the unaudited figures, but there was a "stock Purchase Form" and business reply envelope enclosed. I've been investing for over ten years, and I've never seen THAT before
Novice Bob tells us he may not have a lot of time to do his DD during the day, but I do, and I've done a lot. IMO, many of you are so fascinated with this story that you may have forgotten to keep checking for fundamental value.
What amazes me is that with all the companies that are fully reporting, have audited numbers, solid profits, established products, growing margins, measurable market share, etc, etc,...well, it's clear that my style of investing doesn't fit well here. Obviously I'm not going to buy TSIS, but for those of you who have and will, I hope it works out well. |
