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.

Strategies & Market Trends : Gorilla and King Portfolio Candidates -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Brian K Crawford who wrote (691)	3/6/1999 2:40:00 PM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 54805

Any one else have more insight? Yeah. Count on ORCL management to figure out a way to screw it up!

To: Brian K Crawford who wrote (691)	3/6/1999 7:09:00 PM
From: William	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

I would say to be most careful with these types of projections. Have you ever had the boss come to you and ask "How much (fill in the blank) are we going to use next year?". The blank could be computer time, widgets, bars of soap, band-aids or anything else. You don't know how much you have used this year, never mind how much will be used next year. So after some careful consideration, you come up with your best SWAG. And it is usually of the form of this year plus 5 percent. Now for the sake of this topic we are referring to along comes some outfit like Soundview, conducting a survey of companies, on whatever. Who do they talk to at the companies being asked the questions. Are they the same level of knowledge at all companies being asked the questions (not possible). How much time and effort (spelled dollars)goes into answering the questions. It is hard enough for a company to get accurate estimates for its own budget purposes. For some survey to get accurate data from hundreds or thousands of companies is asking an awful lot. William

To: Brian K Crawford who wrote (691)	3/7/1999 1:29:00 AM
From: Mike Buckley	Respond to of 54805

Brian, Any one else have more insight? My impression is that there is more validity in the trends of numbers of that sort than in the details. Seeing Oracle and Cisco near the top is a more valid indicator for me than the specific numbers. Similarly, I don't take five-year forcasts seriously. It's too hard to predict what will happen three years out. If I see that analysts are expecting a high-tech industry to grow 50% a year, I don't bank on that happening. But I do make investment decisions based on it being one of the faster growing industries regardless of what happens to the economy. Good to see you in the folder! --Mike Buckley

To: Brian K Crawford who wrote (691)	3/7/1999 8:56:00 AM
From: chaz	Respond to of 54805

I would trust publisher estimates more fully than those obtained by an industry participant. I'm 15 years out of the business, but I doubt the techniques have changed. As advertising sales people, we were interested in how much ad space our customers planned to run, and how much our magazines would get, from that we built our own budgets. The key of course was the reliability of the salesman's original estimate for the advertisers in his/her territory, the historical probability that our percentage wouldn't change much, and some other things....which may interest those here. If a company is going to increase sales, it'll advertise more. In the technology area, increased sales don't come from old products, ergo, the winners will introduce new products, but only if they have an R&D program that will produce them. So, one of the questions our sales folks always slipped in during the year was "How does your R&D spending this year compare to last?" Using the prior year's spending trend, we could place a confidence % on next year's ad forecasts. At the firm I was with, this worked a bunch more than it didn't. Among the questions I would ask is the degree to which these %'s are supported by history and related data figures.