VTPI...Wall Street West Newswire..JUST OUT Editor@wallstreetwest.com (Wall Street West Newswire) SHORT TERM PICK OF THE WEEK: AN EXPLOSIVE OPPORTUNITY
Visual Telephone Products International, Inc. (OTC-BB-VTPI-.21) We sent out a stock alert about this one on Friday as a highly speculative pick based on technical analysis. We always like to catch them as early as possible. The activity in this stock proves that sometimes even the dead can rise. Here are the details behind the story:
VTPI essentially manufactures and distributes PC-based desktop video conferencing products for small to medium sized businesses. It seems that the Company has had no press releases since last fall. The last press release talked about showing the products at some type of convention. It seems that this lack of press activity brought the stock down to the .09 area, where it has languished for months.
Something has caused this stock to suddenly explode. Volume over the past several days has been increasing, and the price has been skyrocketing. We tried to find out why and found very little information about this company. We did, however, find information at Techstocks.com, a stock chat website. No one seems to know anything, but speculation abounds about a takeover, acquisition, buyout, or financing deal. It is said that a press release is due out by May 15.
Here is a write up we received this morning:
Visual Telephone International, and its wholly owned subsidiary Communications Research, Inc., are jointly active in the world wide marketing and manufacturing of the most advanced Desktop Video Conference products, providing the highest performance, simplest operation and lowest cost in a PC based system that meets ITU H.320 International Standards Compliance. The Company's have combined offices in Northern New Jersey, conveniently located in the New York metropolitan area.
The Company trades on the OTC Electronic Bulletin Board under the symbol "VTPI" and targets its products and services to Videoconference, Distant Learning, Telemedicine and Security/Surveillance end-users. Based upon industry trends for the past several years, the Company strongly believes that the videoconferencing industry, and the services related to that industry, are poised for significant and continuous growth well into the next century.
The Desktop Video Conference Market
The Company feels it is well situated to capture a significant niche in the Videoconferencing industry. During the last few years, the VideoConferencing Industry has shown the potential for tremendous growth. The use of compressed video for electronic meetings has increased exponentially in the past several years as codec and transmission costs have tumbled with technology breakthroughs.
With the growing corporate desire for electronic meetings, the market is now demanding a desktop video environment to expand the horizons of corporate communications. The Telephone Industry is moving toward a single unified digital network for voice, data, and video. The Integrated Services Digital Network ("ISDN") is expected to deliver digital connectivity to every home and office in the eveloped world. The ready availability of such circuits will significantly and quickly increase the volume of potential customers, beyond the current market of government, hospitals and large corporations.
Prompting the explosion of Videoconferencing has been the development of the evolving World standards by ITU, formally the International Telegraph and Telephone Consultative Committee (CCITT), the world communication standards organization. This standard, referred to as H.320 for Compressed Videoconferencing and Desktop Visual Telephones (DVT), is being supported by the American National Standard Institute (ANSI) and manufacturers in North America, Europe and Far East. Visual Telephone International is in full compliance with the standards and provides interchange with all manufactures equipment that are standards based.
The use of compressed video for business has developed over the past decade from a small base of Corporate Conference Centers which demonstrated the effectiveness of the technology. However, the market's growth was constrained by the inherent resistance to travel (even a short distance) for a videoconference, resource scheduling requirements, high startup costs, large space allocations and cumbersome systems operations. Many of the current systems are plagued by problems such as low quality, high price, difficulty of use and high maintenance requirements. Visual Telephone International has created a systems solution to solve those problems, creating a low-price/high performance product that can be used with little more technical sophistication than a standard telephone. Trade press and conferences have supported the Company's vision of a unified executive workstation, built around a Personal Computer, with easy use for the everyday worker, as the future for the Videoconferencing industry.
With constantly improving quality, technology and falling prices the potential for everyday residential usage of a videophone and its applications over the internet are just around the corner. While the Company does not expect to immediately compete in this area, as the industry grows and the demand for the Company's products increase, the Company will be competitively positioned to consider entering this market as it develops.
Corporate Strategy
The primary short term goal of the Company is to increase awareness of its products, highlighting the Visual 1000, Visual 2000, and the critically acclaimed Visual 1100 series. The Company's products have consistently outperformed all other systems in industry-wide systems operability tests at several recent conventions including the one performed by Compunetrics at the ITCA '97 conference in Washington, D.C. and a successful showing at the COMDEX in Las Vegas in the Fall of 1996. The Visual-1000 has turned heads at conventions with its full motion video over a single ISDN line while operating at a bandwidth of 128 Kbps.
Coupled with the Company's lower cost, and therefore lower price structure, the Company firmly believes that its products will be in high demand once the Company is able to increase public awareness, with particular emphasis in the key industries targeted for videoconferencing growth. The Company will also increase awareness through joint ventures and strategic alliances with companies that have complimenting products and technology, by developing a reselling structure with partners that can strongly market the Company's products.
The short term goal of establishing greater market awareness will continue to be met by a program of advertising, trade show participation and direct contacts with known users of videoconferencing solutions that realize the benefits of the technology. Key personnel target the end user market through trade shows and a network of Pro Reps that manage geographic regions Nationally and Internationally.
The Company will also make use of consulting arrangements with industry professionals who have necessary expertise and connections for sales and development of the Company's products, but lack the time to dedicate themselves to the Company on a full time basis. Master Distributors that are proven leaders in the deployment of technically sophisticated systems will be added to the sales force to increase market exposure.
The Company's long term objective is to aggressively grow the sales of its current products and to stay ahead of the curve in developing new products in this quickly evolving industry. The key to long term survival is staying on the cutting edge of technological developments and industry practices. Clients demand a product with technological sophistication that is easy to use. The more user friendly and application specific the videophone system is for each customer, the greater will be our penetration into the marketplace.
Visual Telephone International, Inc. 69 Wesley Street South Hackensack, NJ 07606 Toll Free 1 888-VISTELE ( 1 888-847-8353 ) Tel 201-525-0777 Fax 201-457-0400 E-mail info@vistele.com vistele.com
The stock behaves very much like PLFM, another penny Wall Street West featured stock that recently rose from the .19 area to as high as $1.80. We look for volume to build, and the price to move up gradually, maybe .02 to .05 per day. Once the story is out, we look for the stock to explode. We are prepared to hold throughout May if necessary.
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