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Strategies & Market Trends : VOLTAIRE'S PORCH-MODERATED -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Voltaire who wrote (27255)	12/27/2000 12:44:04 AM
From: KHS	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 65232

Hi Voltaire.... If I were a reporter. Oh if I were only just a reporter for one day, I'd spin it this way..... I love to write... ___________________________________ Way back in 1985, light years to our communications revolution, contact centers existed. No they were not called "touch points"--"multimedia contact centers"--"entry point" etc, they were just called "call Centers". Well, what is significant about this you may ask? Call Centers were call centers. A business tool mainly for mission critical communications windows for customers of healthcare, banking, utility, and catalog companies. How many players (vendors) were around in 1985 to provide hardware, software, and support for this market? Glad you asked. Try Lucent, Nortel (indirect distribution), and then Aspect Communications. Pretty good company I would say! And guess what? Aspect has grown 10 fold since, and was a force that Lucent and Nortel has to recon with. Not bad I'd say. Aspect played ball with the best and became known as the company that sold the "Range Rover" of systems. Their products pumped 24 hours a day and handled heavy loads of telephone calls. Aspect's software enhancements throughout the early 1990's was well rounded and always pushed Lucent and Nortel. Aspect customers were early adoptors. They had big money and the need to implement and Aspect had the breadth of support to handle the job. Then came CTI, for those outside the business, stands for Computer Telephony Interface. Hmmm, the foundation for linking computers and telephones to enhance the ability for companies to handle customer communications in a productive fashion. But where was the true enabler for CTI? Glad you asked! The INTERNET, yes and ecommerce of all sorts. Finally the foundation was in place for product development and a great opportunity for corporations to make money. Then came a bunch of new commers and the big players Lucent and Nortel needed to play catch up fast. But guess what? Glad you asked! Aspect took on a very aggressive plan to better position themselves for the opportunity. They issued securities and raised a couple hundred million with very good terms and minimal dilution to the existing shares. They transformed their product to software centric, they made key acquisitions to round out their product, and are in the mist of increasing the direct sales force by 50%. Their partners and indirect channels are becoming productive and include some of the very best integrators in the business today. And they did this without hardly missing a beat. Over the last 2 years I would call net breakeven, no burn rate, with 20% sales increase pretty good. OH, CAN'T FORGET THEY DID INVEST $100 MILLION BACK INTO R & D LAST YEAR. I CALL THIS A GREAT ACT OF SPENDING YOUR MONEY AT THE RIGHT TIME ON THE RIGHT THINGS. YES, THIS IS A CASE WHERE A COMPANY REALLY DOES WANT TO INCREASE SHAREHOLDER EQUITY. MY GOODNESS THEY ARE BUYING BACK SOME OF THE FLOAT ALONG THE WAY. ASPECT MANAGEMENT COULD HAVE EASILY SHOWN $1 IN EARNINGS THIS YEAR, BUT THEY ARE INVESTING THE CASH FLOW RIGHT BACK INTO THE BUSINESS. I LIKE TO SEE CAPITAL DEPLOYED. CHURNING THE ENGINES OF GROWTH. TAXABLE EARNINGS WILL FOLLOW SOON ENOUGH FOR THE IRS. Management is seasoned but Wall Street is wary. Why I don't know. Can't figure it out. These folks are good people. Why have the analyst been so hard on them? Maybe because they really don't know Aspect's products very well and with the foresight to see the future with much clarity. The analyst just look at the numbers and see that Aspect hasn't grown over the last two years as fast as the FRESHMAN IPO'S have. But Aspect is coming from a much larger sales base. I'd doubt the high fliers will ever exceed Aspects total revenue. Hey you Analyst, ya you, wake up and make some real money for your clients. Best $400 million dollar market cap company out there right now. disclosure: I am long Aspect Communications.. ASPT Keith.....