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Technology Stocks : ATPX: Lunn Industries and Technical Products Group merge. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: lostmymoney who wrote (1151)	12/20/1997 12:17:00 PM
From: VALUESPEC	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 1923

Year to year comparisons are still not great, however, sequential growth seems back on target. THE COMBINED COMPANIES EARNED (year over year): .14 in 1Q 1996 lost .01 in the 1 Q 1997 .31 in 2Q 1996 .24 in 2Q 1997 (ended 6-30-97) .28 in 3Q 1997 (ended 9-30-97) Sales/earnings for the combined companies for the first three quarter's of 1997 were: 1Q 1997 Revenues of $ 28.8 million Net loss of $ 76,000 EPS (.01) Shares 5.5 million 2Q 1997 Revenues of 33.8 mil Net income of $1.3 million EPS of .24 Shares 5.5 mil 3Q 1997 Revenues of 34.7 mil Net income of $1.6 million EPS of .28 Shares 5.5 million BACKLOG COMPARISONS Backlog as of 9-15-97: <<TPG contract backlog at 9-15-97 is $585mm. Of that sum, $145mm is released for production, and $440mm is options or unreleased orders (subject to revision or cancellation). These numbers are up significantly year-to-year. See P.66 of S-4/A.>> Backlog as of now: <<The company also reported the total backlog of customer orders, including options and unreleased orders, was about $800 million, compared with $320 million for same period in 1996.>> Notice that the backlog increased from 585mm on 9-15-97 to about $800 million today. The important number was the "released for production number". I'm wondering why that wasn't included this time, especially since that is most indicative of revenues for the immediate future. Often backlogs include options, etc., that never materialize. One should keep that in mind when interpreting this kind of information. Other than that, the increase in backlog seems very promising. All in all, I'd say this was good news for ATPX shareholders (I'm not one at this time. Unfortunately, I missed the press release). It shows the combined company is headed in the right direction, though revenue growth is still slower than desired. If someone can find out what the "released for production number" is, that would tell us a lot about the next quarter's prospects. Without that number, however, I personally will have to reserve final judgement on whether or not I think ATPX has demonstrated that it has turned the corner. At this time, I'd say it looks promising, but I'm still skeptical becuase of the lack of backlog clarification. Remember, its easy to play with non confirmed backlogs in order to impress people. On friday, ATPX closed at $ 13.125b $ 14.00 a and closed @ $13.25 It's still not back to the pre-merger price of $ 15.60 ($ 1.56 X 10), but at least because of the sequential earnings increase, there are some preliminary reasons to justify its current price, or better. VALUESPEC