Doc,
Thanks for your reply. I am a communication systems engineer, working primarily with satellite systems and the associated ground networks. The latter affords me some involvement with networks and protocols. I'm not really versed in computer science. I'm the sort who knows enough UNIX to be extremely dangerous. I may take you up on the contact that you offered in your post.
Although it sounds kind of trivial, IMO the basic issue long vs short on ZITL is valuation. Most sensible analysis of M-D would concede that the company has some sort of solution to the problem that will generate revenue. Also a sensible analysis would be that a great deal of expectation is now reflected in the share price. At present, the market for year 2000 services is not accurately known, nor is the ability of M-D to perform as a business. IMO, many things need to go right for these expectations to be realized. Buying ZITL at the current price is certainly speculative, also IMO. Of course, there is the whole risk/reward question--the rewards can be reckoned as great enough to offset the risk. As others have noted, that's what markets are all about.
Going off topic a bit, the undoing of Apple by Microsoft/Intel is an interesting story to me. Many think that Bill Gates succeeded because he created software. While their software skills may be considerable, neither Microsoft or Bill Gates invented very much. They bought DOS, copied Apple (who in turn took their ideas from Xerox's PARC),etc. They succeeded as businessmen and marketers. Anyway, I've resisted joining up with Bill by buying Microsoft (which has been a big mistake), but we can invest with Bill in a somewhat obscure biotech company.
The company is ICOS and Mr. Gates is the largest shareholder and sits on the board. Being a medical man who is also involved with stocks, I'd be surprised if you didn't follow biotech. The little I know about ICOS is that they are focused on treatments for inflammatory diseases and located in the Seattle area. I read their investor package six months back and nothing really jumped out at me.
Bill holds around $100M of value in the company. It's very important to remember how small a fraction of Gates's worth that is. Nonetheless, it is a lot of money and more than he's got in some higher profile deals. I think he "only" put $10M into DreamWorks SKG and I know he put $10M into Teledesic (along with Craig McCaw), neither of which is traded to the public. The investment in Teledesic is curious in that in is a very agressive business plan both technically and financially. I can go on more about it in another post. Suffice to say that they are talking about launching and maintaining a constellation of 840 satellites (not real small ones either). Gates and McCaw may have a variety of reasons for the investment, and no one knows what Teledesic may really be planning.
Anyway, if you're interested in ICOS we can post on it--you can e-mail me at: lylea@pacbell.net
The address in my profile is at work and has a typo besides. There also is a ICOS thread on SI under the biotech topic.
Regards,
Lyle
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