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Technology Stocks : CheckFree Holdings Corp. (CKFR), the next Dell, Intel? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mike Milde who wrote (6321)	6/15/1999 9:56:00 AM
From: zuma_rk	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 20297

More quick thoughts -- Responding to Pete's quote -- "We know that if it comes down to a test of performance, we win." Well, if it comes down to a test of marketing clout, who wins then...? CF has not dazzled with its ability to define itself to the marketplace as a quality brand. Consumers will simply think that Yahoo has developed this neat-o billpay thing, and if they can do it, certainly others might be able to do it even better (after all, the user interface appears to be so "simple"). Not to drudge up dreary comparisons, but Netscape Navigator beat the pants off of Internet Explorer only a couple of years ago. Also, if I worked at Transpoint, I would have been easily able to glean the following from the call (and subsequent "instant" news that came out): --time to haul out the Microsoft marketing machine and offer tie-ins and free products for trying our billpay product. Memo to self: talk to Bill G. about bundling a bill payment engine into Internet Explorer or the next version of MS Office (maybe as part of that Microsoft "wallet" thing). Maybe give away something nice and valuable -- hey, how about free, real-time streaming stock quotes on MS Investor if you try paying your bills online... --time to aggressively develop the (large) business-to-business market, 'cause CF said that they're basically not going there. Then, leverage down from businesses to consumers over time. Again, sorry for the negative sentiment, but I can't for the life of me, figure out why the company did this call, or how it could be construed as positive without any accompanying announcements or deals... I'm just not sure what management was thinking, I mean, if they sat there with a blank sheet of paper and wrote, "What is the overall theme of our conference call?," the best I could come up with is: a) losses for the foreseeable future b) we have to do this call because we want to share the info we're presenting on the roadshow (noble effort, but is this really necessary?) c) let's have the press lock onto our quest for a huge portion of 100 million potential customers (deflated effort due to lack of ability to disclose partners -- creates a hazy, but nonetheless very high bar to jump over) rk ps - capt'n tony - just read your post, and agree that (just like our SI conference last year), ya gotta love the company's attempts to be open with its investors. I'm just hung up on the "theme" element in terms of what they were trying to have folks remember when they hang up the phone or finish reading the news flash...