So is this an investor thread or a techie thread?
Yes, I know the techology. I have one at home connected to an ISDN line. O.K.?
What I mean is, shouldn't this thread focus on SGI's business fundamentals?
Like: P/E, cash flow, head count, expansion plans, assimilation of acquired companies, targets for acquisition, takeover rumors?
I don't see that arguing about the merits of NT versus IRIX to be beneficial to shareholders.
With over 1,000 shares onhand, I'm interested in market receptivity of their new platform, expansion of core business segments, cost reductions, successes with government bids and, most of all, their future channel(s) of distribution: will it continue to be a direct model or will SGI finally make the leap toward two-tier distribution through the global powerhouses of wholesale distribution like Ingram Micro, Tech Data, Merisel, Computer 2000 and Access Graphics (who does a nominal job right now with SGI)?
Who knows some answers to these questions? Debating real-time processing speed and various client-server scenarios with NT as a fulcrum doesn't provide much in the way of investor insight.
Tell me I'm a kook, but the stock's trying to do something--up or down I'm not sure. We collectively need to look at the company's core business value within the global computing community. Is SGI going to market itself as the computing company of choice? They're engineering-driven which has really put a hole in their
marketing wherewithal. While Microsoft, Intel, AMD and IBM spend over $2 billion dollars collectively, I understand SGI spends less than $25 million on external marketing. Can this be true? Who knows their plan? Where are they going to take us and the company? I don't want SGI to be pigeon-holed into being a "boutique computer" within niche markets like animation, movie-making and science applications. Their stuff is friggin great, technically superior and they helped invent The Web as we know it. A lot of their "good people" have left for greener pastures and little start-ups (thank you Netscape, et al).
They have a ton of new directors and vice presidents, a completely empowered management team. Are they suffering from analysis paralysis? Are they going to suffer another quarter trying to "re-group."
What do you say? Anyone have the skinny on SGI's business future rather than all the techno-babble? |
