Dear Tyler,
I am writing this letter so that you may forward it to "the powers that be".
I am a shareholder (75,000 to be exact). I originally bought a position in
April of 1995 at a split adjusted price of 3/4. I subsequently sold that
position and made a very nice profit. Thank you Iomega. In the fall of 1998
about a month before Mr.. Glore coming on board I began to establish a new
position and currently have an average price/share of 5.91.
I believe that Iomega is in a "once in a life time" position right now. With
new products and no competition in the Zip and Jaz market, except for maybe,
CD-RW, the company has an opportunity to almost be the "Microsoft" of the
storage business. I believe Iomega should strive to compete with the EMCs of
the world, in the high end network storage market, a market which Iomega
does not have a real presence in now, but one that Iomega could easily
leverage it's brand recognition, to help enter into.
What concerns me is this:
While the Kim Edwards era was one of many "press" releases, the Glore era
seems to be shaping up to be the other end of the spectrum in terms of it's
very conservative marketing approach, both of the products and of the
Company.
We have been promised a Y2K marketing campaign....where is it?
A Pub TV or cable TV ad can't cost that much. The "Hello Cruel World" Zip
250 campaign is not much, to say the least.
I am concerned in what must be a nightmare for a "functional" business with
a virtual enterprise, build to order model: A decrease in demand or a
decrease in the demand growth rate. Zip is reaching critical mass at the
25-30 million drive area......its time to slam the door shut and explode in
terms of unit growth.
If Iomega want to become a "$10 Billion" company then marketing better be
pretty darn good and up to now from what I've seen it's not.
Hiring a Senior Exec VP for marketing at this time is overdue and should be
a priority above finding a new CFO.
Operations seem to be coming under control, but somebody's going to have to
start doing a better job at selling, the product and The Company.
Sincerely,
Frank
A Shareholder
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