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Technology Stocks : COMS & the Ghost of USRX w/ other STUFF -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: mr.mark who wrote (20146)	2/28/2000 7:25:00 PM
From: Moonray	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 22053

3Com's Palm Doubles Price of IPO Shares to $30-$32 (Update1) (Adds background throughout.) Santa Clara, California, Feb. 28 (Bloomberg) -- 3Com Corp.'s Palm Inc. electronic organizer unit expects to raise as much as $736 million from its initial sale Wednesday, double its original estimate. That would value Palm at $18 billion, almost as much as Apple Computer Inc and J.P. Morgan & Co., for the roughly 4 percent stake, or 23 million shares, that 3com is selling off at $30-32 per share. 3Com plans to spin off the rest of its Palm stake to 3Com shareholders in six months. Palm's shares will trade under the symbol PALM on the Nasdaq Stock Market starting Thursday, after a sale led by Goldman, Sachs & Co. This is ``almost a no-brainer,' said Irv DeGraw, research director at WorldFinanceNet.com in Sarasota, Florida, which provides news and investment advice for individual online investors. More than 5.5 million Palm organizers have been sold in the four years since the electronic notebook PalmPilot was introduced. Consumers use a stylus to input addresses and appointments on the device's liquid-crystal screen, which connects to a personal computer to retrieve information and programs. Palm's sales rose 76 percent to $259 million in the quarter ended Nov. 26. Net income rose 58 percent to $12.9 million. Lofty Forecasts ``I haven't seen this much enthusiasm for a public offering since Netscape,' said David Powers, an analyst at retail brokerage Edward Jones in St. Louis, who rates 3Com shares a ``hold.' Shares of Netscape Communications Corp., maker of the once- dominant Internet browser, more than doubled in their first day of trading in August 1995. America Online Inc., the world's largest online service, bought the company in March 1999 for $9.8 billion in stock. Many Internet and computer-related IPOs surge when they begin trading because they sell relatively small stakes, so demand often outstrips supply. The initial, first-day surge is, however, no guarantee of future success. Some well-publicized Internet IPOs have peaked in the first weeks or months of trading, only to fade thereafter. 3Com ``might not be quite as explosive as the others, but it will have room to move up,' said Eric Efron, co-manager of the $2.3 billion USAA Aggressive Growth Fund in San Antonio. Efron said he's interested in buying Palm shares. Investors are betting that Palm will keep its lead in the organizer market with easier-to-use devices and benefit from licensing its software to companies such as Nokia Oyj, the world's largest cell-phone maker, and consumer-electronics maker Sony Corp. for use in new wireless devices. ``Their move into wireless is an extremely astute move,' said DeGraw of WorldFinanceNet.com. ``They've got the lead and they're not looking back.' 3Com and Palm are based in the same corporate campus in Santa Clara, California. Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co., Merrill Lynch & Co., and Robertson Stephens are managing the sale. Whoopee!!! o~~~ O