Re: To all: I've noticed that some posters are asking - Wolf
in response to
by
posted on
Nov 01, 2007 08:58AM
After all the stupidity that this board has depicted lately (e.g., word games, challenges, personal attacks, posts about posts, posts about ignoring posts and, more than anything else, posts having zero to do with PTSC - while valid posts about PTSC/what's going on go abandonned), I'm trying to step in and respond to you - tredding very lightly. Everyone seems extremely "sensitized" right now, for no apparent reason other than the fact that we are finally on the cusp of great things. That's a good reason for everyone to get "freaky", right? LOL
You and I have briefly debated your contentions about management and PTSC's plan. You KNOW my position, and I KNOW your's. Tacit "agree to disagree" in place. But, similar to my dogged responses to ttccrr, when you keep bringing it up, I'm compelled to respond. No evil intent - mere debate.
While I completely agree that a couple of BoD members bring highly questionable value to the prospects of PTSC and that there have been many perceived mis-steps by management in the past, I disagree that things are as you depict in your critical posts. I'm not knocking the criticism, as it opens a debate - so here it comes.
You complain that PTSC isn't doing anything. How do you KNOW this? I noted recently that Turley is dedicated 60+ hours a week in his new position. And we KNOW that he and others are reviewing hundreds of companies as acquisition candidates. We KNOW that it is their intent to acquire one or more companies over the next year or so, maybe sooner (as I seem to recall Turley once saying that we'd hear something before year's end). Doing nothing?
I assume, during your tenure in management, that on more than one occasion you had to deal with layoffs. How did you approach this task? Having worked in areospace my entire career, I was faced with this difficulty many times - funding was at the whims of Congress. What we did was a "stacking" exercise, identifying as best we could the value of each employee - top to bottom. A painful experience, and a real challenge to managers arguing, in a locked room, the merits of each of their respective staff members. Many hours of deliberation, to ultimately identify the 10% (or whatever) had to go to meet the newly imposed budget (which meant pay rates came into play - adding to the complexity). Each person had their unique value to the operation.
Now I've set up the analogy. What Turley and friends are doing today is essentially a stacking exercise of elements having a great deal more complexity, only they are not trying to cut out 10%, but 95+%. A daunting task. And what budget are they trying to meet? Unknown. Or, something less than say $10M if the intent is to act TODAY (they could leverage for more, but the risk exagerates accordingly). The only thing I'd suggest is fairly obvious is that the ONLY option available is to make an acquisition, or possibly merge.
Okay, they've presumeably been engaged in this effort for a few months. Much of this time probably involved the mere identification of candidates to be stacked, and accumulating hard data on those candidates. Assuming there are three people engaged in this effort, and perhaps some consultants, this is a time consuming effort. The wrong decision would be a disaster.
What I'm obviously boiling down to is that me thinks your expectations for immediate action are a bit grandeos.
Then there's the unknown "budget". We have peanuts to spend today, but hopefully lots more coming - though still an unknown amount.
So, the stacking exercise just got a lot more complex. "What ifs" come into play. Now you're stacking based on various scenarios of potential income. Unless, of course, you see it as absolutely essential that you do something with what little resources you currently have available (which appears to be your position), which ain't much.
Bottom lines IMO:
PTSC has advised of their business plan to the degree of detail they can/should. And it appears to me to be a compelling, viable plan. Acquire. You can't reasonably expect any greater details.
PTSC has the right people equipped to identify and evaluate the candidates - two techie types with a solid, broad view of the marketplace, and a strong financial type to go over the books of each. Added talent for the endeavor can be pulled in as consultants.
This stuff takes a lot of time, and they can't afford a FU. And time will reveal the probable "budget" going forward.
Now, you talk of changing the direction of the company, NOW. Do you wish them not to pursue an acquisition (which I see as the only viable avenue)? Or do you wish them to execute an acquisition immediately, without having fully weighed the alternatives/candidates, and without having a solid clue about their "budget" going forward (and by doing so, they would actually be pursuing their stated business plan, but in an expedited fashion)?
I post this to provoke thought, and perhaps further debate (I've countered your position - job done - and we could continue with the tacit "agree to disagree" and that would be fine).
BTW, the only immediate change in direction I'd like to see (which is actually along the lines of the stated business plans) is to very agressively buy back stock ASAP. At this point in time/events (assuming we all are correct in our assumptions about the purpose of the Stay), more than ever, this would appear the wisest action. Raise the base PPS, capitalize on a pop > more money in the bank.
All JMHOs.
Respectfully,
SGE