To: Larry E Smith who wrote (1261 ) 6/13/1998 9:52:00 AM From: Jeffrey L. Henken Respond to
I found another interesting post from a guy who seems to work at AVE over at the Yahoo AVEI thread. I thought you all might like to read it:messages.yahoo.com @m2.yahoo.comHi everyone. Just wanted to give you news from the trenches. Gfx is surpassing our wildest expectations. I had my best month ever last month (with huge backorders), sales over $800K. This month will be even better, with sales a little over $1MM. I can tell you that gfx has really taken stenting to a new level and cards are acutely aware that this 4th generation stent is the real McCoy. I have to admit that the Micro 2, while wildly successful, had problems relating to bulkiness, trackability in some instances, and the perception of too much open area. Gfx has addressed all those problems and I rarely hear of situations where it fails to cross. I feel very good about 2nd quarter sales surpassing 1st quarter. Do I want Schneider? Mixed feelings at best. Dilutive short-term, yes (I am a shareholder), but probably not a bad move long term. The negatives are a product portfolio that is fairly weak, altho intellectual property interesting and a nice peripheral line. There is, however, a "PLAN B" I am not privy to if we don't get Schneider. NIR: Will be formidable initially and will cut into marketshare. I do believe however, that we have a salesforce 2nd to none and that SciMed does not have the great reps that they used to. Also hearing that the comp. plan for the NIR is less than sterling, so some dissatisfaction there. Bottom line, if AVE can keep churning out technology that is compelling and add to their portfolio with strategic acquisitions, we will be a player for a long time. Stockwise, if we continue to get punished because we have some marketshare erosion, yet continue to post strong earnings through '99, then I guess strong growth isn't valued in this market, just meeting the chickenshit "concensus" estimate. I am very long on AVE, I absolutely love the people in this co., and while I was sad to see Jendersee go, we have some amazingly dedicated engineers that I have complete faith in. Everybody hold on, the battle is just beginning!
