Victor- In Feb. when the first whispers of the quarter came out (Mason's off-handed comment to an analyst), Mason claimed that the problem was the small/medium sized market.....(that the corporate market was OK!)....Now, the problem is really the corporate space..
In January, Pfeiffer said that Compaq was taking marketshare from Dell....Recently, Steve Milunovich (sp?) of Merrill Lynch and Infobeads report that Dell is taking significant share (in the corporate space) from Compaq.
MDell just said industry demand is healthy, EPfeiffer says he sees a definite downturn, and that it will affect others in the industry (implying Gateway and Dell)...that industry demand is 8-9% this quarter (Dell puts it at 14%) y-o-y growth...
Pfeiffer, in one article posted last night, called this whole debacle "no big deal"..
Compaq reports this debacle on April 9th, and STILL can't pin down what the real problem is....
Is there any wonder there is a credibility problem here? The market certainly looks to see it that way today (mostly Compaq-specific).......If Intel reports above-consensus, Pfeiffer is going to look foolish (again)..
IMO, Pfeiffer should go.
A "Pfeiffer/Mason are being eased out" announcement PLUS an Alta-Vista announcement on the 21st would boost the stock a few points, IMO... |
