shareholders' meeting report:
I'll try to keep this fairly brief. First thing I noticed was that there were very few people there - probably not 10 outside of company folks, so much lower attendance than last year. The mood was pretty somber. The business transacted was brief, with all 3 points passing (appointing a board member, appointing an accounting firm, and doubling the number of shares authorized (currently 19M float, 50M authorized; now 100M authorized)). I can't imagine what good more shares at 5 or 10¢ will do, but Mike and Charles seem to want them, so ok. 15M of the 19M float was present or proxied, so the mtg was plenty official.
Mike claimed that they've honed their technology over the past year, making it even quicker and smaller, but there is no revenue to speak of and their biggest problem is $$$. Big surprise. Most of the meeting was spent talking about and being talked to by "Diana of Averil," a mergers and acquisition firm that is going to help Mike and Charles raise money. Their target is $1M in the next month or so, and $5M in the next 12 to 18 months. The stock price is clearly not going anywhere anytime soon - this company is fighting for survival. There has been some bad luck in their choices of partners - nVidia was a bomb because as soon as they went public, 3DFX sued them for patent infringement, so they're busy with their own probs and don't have time for SNNT right now, and their hot new partner for other RVR uses (quasi-architectural, I think), Evans and Sutherland, doesn't have any extra dough at them moment either, also from sorry spending problems. The medical application, Accuscape, seems to be somewhat dormant and wasn't discussed a lot. So, their big push for making money off RVR will be "e-commerce," sort of a chichi catch-phrase which may or may not ever be anything. They'd like to get their viewer, the one you can download from their site, into as wide use as possible so more people become aware of our capabilities. With so few employees, I'm not sure how they make a big web splash. They have the right idea about open-sourcing their stuff and licensing ideas, I'm just not convinced they can pull it off before they starve. SNNT really is hanging by a shoestring. I will be hanging on to my paltry position because it's not worth much anyway, and Mike and Charles are sharp and good guys who are banging away at this as mightily as they can. That's the good news. So folks, there you have it. Wish I could've brought you better news.
-Bob |
