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Technology Stocks : The New QLogic (ANCR) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Erik Lundby who wrote (16163)	5/12/1998 5:22:00 PM
From: trendmastr	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 29386

re-posted from MF boards with the author's permission.... <<I should probably just let this pass, but, for what ever reason (maybe boredom), I have decided to respond. I don't think we can give Planelane the credit for killing this board. The reason this board is dead is because Ancor has consistently failed to perform as promised. When I originally bought this stock, I was expecting it to be profitable by 12/96 (could that be?). Then the Sequent contract got delayed and eventually cancelled. Profitablility, however, was "just around the corner." The joint product with NTT was to be ready in 1998 (now we find out it wasn't a product, it was who knows what); the defence contract that wasn't; the reseller contracts that weren't; the potential OEM's that weren't so potential; and now the rumor that the OEM for storage for IBM is going to go to Brocade (just a rumor). Management missed the mark on the switch (investing a lot in class 1 while Brocade went about their business selling millions of dollars worth of class 3 switches) and, IMHO, poorly managed the cash flow (I can only imagine that they believed their own hype) with multiple product returns, charges for obsolete inventory, shot gun approach to marketing. In addition, it dragged itself into a law suit which potentially could have been avoided and lost credibility in the process. But now things are looking up. We just came through interop with no new products (as far as I can tell) (in fact, I haven't even found a post by someone who actually went about how good the presentation was--this includes the SI board) and a quarter about as unremarkable as I can imagine this company having and downgrades by Kinnard. But we have the annual board meeting to look forward to where we're being asked to increase the number of shares (so we can further dilute this stock in order to keep the company afloat and take advantage of ?acquisition? potentials) and vote for board members who don't own any stock (does this make sense???; at $5-6 a share, you would think they could afford at least a little bit). So, no. I really don't think Planelane should receive credit for killing this board- Ancor did that all by themselves, without ever placing even a single post, thank you very much. As far as I know, no one's been permanently banished from posting on this board. Where are KL Hot Dog, "watch the clock" stu, "let's get focused" Rufscanti (sp?), longbow, and moo cow? If they left, it's not because Planelane "drove them out." It's because they chose to. And who could blame them. There's not a lot to talk about (even the SI board seems to spends more time talking about the FC industry than they do about Ancor) and anyway, who wants to talk about a sinking ship they own? So why do I keep owning this stock? That's a question I ask myself all the time. The other question is, is this a company I would want to invest in now if I had never invested in it in the first place? Do I hold because of denial, foolishness, or under the veil of long-term investor. Unfortunately, blindly holding a tech company under the veil of long-term investor can be costly. While some small tech companies initially flounder only to later win big, others just sputter and die. There are only a few positives and none of these are quantifiable. One positive is that they seem to have enough cash to last until the end of the year. Hopefully by that time, they will have won a significant OEM. But this is all hope with no data to really support it. Another is that current management seems to be managing resources much more wisely, adding appropriately to the personel, and heading this ship towards profitability (new storage backup contracts, IBM). Will it get there, who knows. Will this board still be alive by the time that ship arrives? That's up to all of us to decide, not just Planelane. Best of luck to all Phil >> Is anyone from here planning on attending the annual meeting? tm