"On August 3, 1999, the Research Investment Group from Florida issued a "report" saying that "Omicron offers investors a ground floor opportunity to participate in two new, high growth industries -- digital imaging and Internet gambling." Other reports stated that the advisors who wrote the reports received a fee of stock in Omicron in exchange."
TYPICAL "STARNET SCAM" CLEANS UP $26 MILLION
An obscure Florida company that began life as All Nations Catering Inc. and then changed its name to Omnicron Technologies Inc., subsequently traded on the OTC Bulletin Board, is believed to be part of a $26 million scam to sell its duped investors down the river.
To make a few million dollars in a very short space of time these days seems increasingly easy. We've seen all this before. Hype gone crazy, bullish sentiments expressed via paid mouthpieces (you just get the PR firm to write the press releases, then pay them with stock in the company). The whole exercise becomes entirely subjective, lacking any kind of objective analysis, and the sad part of it is that so many of today's investors continue to "buy the bullshit."
On August 3, 1999, the Research Investment Group from Florida issued a "report" saying that "Omicron offers investors a ground floor opportunity to participate in two new, high growth industries -- digital imaging and Internet gambling." Other reports stated that the advisors who wrote the reports received a fee of stock in Omicron in exchange.
Omnicron's website is no longer available, which seems strange for an outfit that just a year ago had managed to raise at least $26 million from investors, and was seemingly engaged in dozens of activities and plans for its great future.
It's a characterisitic of many dubious companies that they claim to be at the "cutting edge" of technology, just as Starnet did. They are "in the business of acquisition, research and development, and marketing of leading-edge technologies and Internet-based business concepts." That's a conveniently vague statement that fits exactly with so much of the current Internet hype.
In the same breath, the company announces (a) that it is developing an "electronic eye" (courtesy of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, originally created for the space program), a device that allows "for the miniaturization of a full motion video camera down to the size of a microchip" and (b) a rich, dynamic graphic "that will provide players with a real sense of action and participation with no software downloads, a bingo gambling site, utilizing a sophisticated, robotic Java camera," one so sophisticated that the miniature robot camera was to photograph the bingo balls coming out of the machine (MaXum Bingo, operated through a site known as FreeLiveBingo.com -- no longer in business, see below).
This must be what fools some of the investors most of the time. Technology ahead of its time, with words that hardly anyone except scientists or geeks understand, plus for added value, an Internet casino or online gambling site thrown in as the extra icing on the cake.
The company also bought a license to run an online casino, using Starnet's software, targeting Chinese speaking communities worldwide, and available in seven other languages (http://www.luckyeightcasino.com/index2.html).
This is just another of those "Starnet scams," which means lying and promising anything to screw the investors -- the typical Starnet scam!
To get an idea of the woes endured by these hapless investors, just as with those who bought into Starnet, take a look at this chart, a real beauty! There is only one way to describe it: "an inexorable progression towards zero." A brief flight, about as sustained as an arthritic butterfly's, followed by a downward path to more or less nothing.
quicken.excite.com
SEC filings also indicate some unusual capital stock transactions, for example:
"On May 13, 1998, the Company increased its authorized capital to 50,000,000 common shares from 7,500 common shares and changed the par value to $.001 from $1.00. In addition, the existing and outstanding stock was exchanged at the rate of 200 to 1 for new share issued."
"In August 1998, a referral fee of 1,000,000 shares of common stock valued at $1.25 per share was paid to consultant in connection with the option purchase of ViaSpace Technologies, LLC."
"In October 1999, the Company completed the acquisition of ViaSpace Radio, Inc. and Radio Satellite Corporation. Both ViaSpace and Radio Satellite Corporation were merged into one company called Interactive Radio Corporation. The Company paid a total of 5,000,000 shares of restricted 144 common stock to the shareholders which management valued at $15,468,750."
pinksheets.com
The wonders of the Internet are never-ending. It turns out that Radio Satellite Corporation owns three patents which "combine navigation, broadcast and two-way communication services to provide mobile user with e-commerce, e-mail, digital quality music, travel, security, global positioning and gaming at a relatively low cost." That seems to offer one hell of a lot, and note that "gaming" has sneaked in there too.
The accountant responsible for some of Omnicron's SEC filings does not seem too positive about the company's prospects:
The accompanying financial statements have been prepared assuming that the Company will continue as a going concern. As described in Note 1 to the financial statements, the Company is in the development stage, conditions exist which raise substantial doubt about the Company's ability to continue as a going concern unless it is able to generate sufficient cash flows to meet its obligations and sustain its operations. The Company lost $1,572,584 from operations in the year ended December 31, 1998. The financial statements do not include any adjustments that might result from the outcome of this uncertainty.
On July 16, 1999, Omnicron acquired the assets of a Belize corporation known as Kaleidoscope International Ltd. It paid out the equivalent of $336,000 when it exchanged 250,000 shares of restricted 144 stock for the acquisition. This was the deal:
a) Three universal resource locators;
b) Sony Digital Camera and cabling;
c) Demonstration drivers for Java Camera;
d) MaXuM Bingo html development software and design; and
e) A 300 MH Celeron computer.
That's a lot to pay for three website URLs, a Sony camera, some cabling, software and a 300 MH computer imported from the Caribbean country of Belize.
Just like Starnet, all of these companies have been disasters.
The LuckyEightCasino site must have had problems; the Starnet software has too many bugs and players hardly ever get paid their winnings. That's just what happened with some Omnicron companies too: paychecks were late and often bounced.
On the LuckyEightCasino site is a banner for Global Interactive; they were marketing the Starnet software. The RCMP is looking for them; they left Vancouver right after the raid on Starnet's Vancouver offices last August.
globalinteract.com
FreeLiveBingo.com was an Omnicron subsidiary that operated from Burnaby, a suburb of Vancouver, B.C. It closed suddenly last July, leaving players with no prizes. It had lasted just a few months. In contrast, some Bingo sites are popular and successful:
(see:http://www.GamblingMagazine.com/articles/23/23-256.htm)
Although Omnicron's website has gone, it appears to be still in business. Its investor relations phone number takes messages, even though some of them probably contain a few gigabytes of verbal abuse. Omnicron's stock (OGPS) is still being traded; today Friday 25th August, the stock closed at 0.03 (no change) on volume of 134,000, the 52-week range being 0.62 to 3.62.
It looks like a dead duck on these figures:
quicken.excite.com
THE LAST WORD
The message boards give a good recommendation. Here is a recent one.
What the f happened to Omnicron?
Omichron, who also own Freelivebingo.com will have to go Chapter 11 soon if they haven't already. Just from Freelivebingo alone, they owe thousands of dollars to winners of their bingo games, yet they ignore all email inquiries from their players. In addition, they also owe thousands of dollars to employees for back pay for insufficient funds payroll checks. This is NOT a company to buy into…
Posted on 08/10/00 - 1:05 PM (Pacific)
How long before you read on the message boards, "What the f happened to Starnet?" They owe thousands of dollars to winners of their casino games, they ignore all email inquiries from their players, they owe tens of thousands of dollars to licensees, and are being sued for $ 1 billion, and, and…well, you know the rest.
Back to the main page for more on Starnet's huge problems
article # starnet272-2
Editor: Editor@GamblingMagazine.com
Publisher: Publisher@GamblingMagazine.com
Telephone: U.S.A. (212) 208-4414 |
