Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Gold/Mining/Energy : Unitec Int. Controls Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: csm who wrote (82)	1/17/1998 9:01:00 PM
From: John B. Smyth	Respond to of 856

Thanks for the kind words, Stuart. I did get your email earlier today, but will respond again here, for the benefit of other readers. As we use an RTC (real time [calendar] clock) with rollover and leap year capability, and the PCs and workstations that we select for platforms do not use the two digit format, I have assumed that the Y2K would not be a problem for us. Our technical issues have been more related and focused to real-time capture and presentation of data for alarm and control purposes, so we were more concerned with timing issues under 1 second. Y2K problems would affect only our historical database. I have followed some of the internet features on Y2K and am not sure whether in fact our designs are as immune from the problem as we think. Therefor, we will test the products to verify its compliance. I'll post the results on our Website when we finish. Your query came at an interesting time as I received a questionaire from Renaissance Energy relating to that issue. We tested a pilot Wellhead SCADA system for them last month and are currently completing the first order, which we expect to deliver next week. So it is of concern to them too.

To: csm who wrote (82)	1/18/1998 5:53:00 AM
From: Ontopequity	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 856

I'm glad I caught your interest on the other thread. I preffer to speak to you here however, for the benefit of others who are interested. I am a big Warren Buffet fan also, and have read two books about his investment philosophy which is brilliant. The Warren Buffet Way was particularly insightful. I attempt to apply his value approach to junior high technology investing but recognise that Warren Buffet will not invest in High technology because he claims not to understand it. He would not even own a computer until Bill Gates got him playing bridge on the computer. Then he was hooked. He is personal friends with Gates, but to my knowledge didn't invest in Microsoft. You asked me about Unitec's escrowed shares. Escrowed shares are held until certain targets are met, and can be released to trade once these targets are met. Unitec has 7,423,226 shares tied up in Escrow. To my knowledge, These shares will not be released until Unitec achieves a positive cash flow of $ .99 per share. A friend of mine recently invested $ 100,000.00 in Unitec and was asking me about the terms of the escrow agreement. I requested that John Smyth send a copy of the escrow terms over to him. I would suggest that you contact John Smyth with respect to this matter. To my knowledge John has over 5,000,000 of the escrow position, while Britton Capitol Corp. has the ballance.Talk to John for exact amounts. These escrowed shares are not worth anything unless Unitec meets it's targets, and that's what makes the share structure of Unitec so attractive. Unlike many VSE deals where the promoter and the president hype up the stock and then blow out their shares at full retail, Unitec' President and Agent are locked into the deal for the long term success.This escrow arangement provides a tremendous motivation to build the fundamentals of the Company rather than hype the stock. That is why I am confortable with a large portion of my net worth invested in Unitec. As you well know from the reading of Warren Buffet, these fundamentals will eventually be reflected in a higher stock price. One class A share in W . Buffets, Berkshire Hathaway NYSE is over $ 40,000.00 per share! I too am a long term, value investor.If I sell a stock, it means I must risk buying another stock in a company that I may not understand as well, or keep the money tied up in real estate or in the bank. There are only so many Companies that you can really understand very well, so I preffer to invest in a few well understood oportunities. To get to know the management, directors, employees, competition, technology, and what ever I can. This is what Buffet has done with CokaCola, Wells Fargo, Dairy Queen, and the other companies he holds inside Berkshire Hathaway. He has inspired me to do the same in the High technology sector. Rather than flip in and out of ambiguous "stocks", I preffer to invest in "real " companies. Almost all of my net worth is invested in High tech. and I have done very well. I don't want to play the stock market, as playing is for children. I want to buy good solid companies that will be around in twenty years. Feel fee to correspond with me on this or any other company that may interest you. Sincerely, DBT.

To: csm who wrote (82)	1/29/1998 8:05:00 PM
From: John B. Smyth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 856

Following up on the Y2K (Year 2000) question Stuart, we have completed several tests, and have a few more to go. The results: Our MTU (Master Station) graphical interface "Unitec Gold" rolls over without problem for the real-time data collection, display and alarming functions. We will be testing the historical trending to insure it catches the roll over as well. I see no reason for it not to at this point, but need to run several independent tests with all of the systems that we have installed to make sure. Our UIC (remote industrial computer/RTU/PLC) however does not roll over. While we use four digits, only the last two roll over automatically. We need to reset the first two digits using the configuration manager (software that we provide to allow customizing of the communications, input and output parameters). This can be performed from the MTU or in the field. I think we might write a small module to do it automatically from the MTUs during the polling and synchronizing cycles. I will keep you appraised of the other test results. Regards, John