Veritone Inc (VERI)

[GBR]

I think it was deleted from you tube

[cpeter7]

I wonder if this website would work to find the YouTube video

https://archive.org/web/

[GBR]

Hoping aiWare can help differentiate with competition. Customer not married to the same voice model, can replace or switch back and forth between models and orchestrate with other models. Can incorporate digital media hub to facilitate distribution and licensing.

[KVM]

I guess a lot of potential in the space but unfortunately also a lot of competition. Hopefully Vocalid is the game changer for Veri.

[GBR]

Sounds Profitable posted a video either yesterday or the day before on youtube. It was a discussion with Fisher Robison from Veritone. It's already been taken down. It was a demonstration on Veritone Voice, and I know Fisher was being cautious and said something to the effect that he had to be careful what he said and will try to just stick to the demonstration. But now wish I could watch it again to see why they would bother to take it down. Just seem very protective of the information being released.

Just like I went back and could not find the Linkedin post about the new veritone marketing makeover.

[GBR]

blindsided by Amazon tells me the relationship with Amazon not as cozy as Chad tried to describe back in May.

[GBR]

It interesting about Chad's ego. In the quarterly earnings calls, we get to hear all about how great aiWare is, will be billions of end users, tipping point, etc. But then nothing in between earnings calls.

The second quarter showed a sizable ramp in aiWare. But still they insist on being quiet and cloudy about where that growth is coming from. Just don't understand why they are not aggressively marketing about the growth in aiWare that they are experiencing. Just content for aiWare to be almost non existent as far as public marketing efforts, social media posts etc. I don't think you can even find the word aiWare on the Pando website. So they must have something going on behind the scenes. Like you say they are not stupid. Just that from a retail investor perspective, it makes all the sense in the world to shout from the rooftops any success you are having with the Enterprise AI platform that you want to spread to a billion end users.

But again, maybe it's coming with the pending marketing face lift and worlds largest AI ecosystem language. Also when they say ecosystem, that would tie in with the what they have recently been saying about just letting partners develop applications now, as opposed to having to build applications to demonstrate aiWare in the past. So maybe the ecosystem is expanding just fine without Veritone having to talk about it. And maybe quiet for competitive reasons. Let the ecosystem expand and proliferate before the competition knows what hit them.

Worth pointing out that Deloitte is not publicly aggressively marketing CortexAI or AIOPS.D either. So just more of the waiting game i guess.

[KVM]

Well we're blindsided by Amazon and how still remains a puzzle to me. Question is what else are they going to be blindsided by.

[GBR]

lol, well then we would definitely be in the wrong stock.

[beni2020]

I've stated clearly they have done a horrible job of managing expectations. All of the typical Alger responses/excuses are in contrast to previous comments from the C suite.
I have made it clear Chad's ego is not helping the company or the shareholders

[beni2020]

Since I am probably a parahia to the C suite as my emails go directly to RS and CS, I most likely will ask one of the egregiously pathetic analysts to ask for me.
If I can hold out a little longer I think at least one of the different verticals will move the dial in the near term.
My guess is they needed to staff up for an expected contract that has been delayed for any number of reasons. They won't continue to hire more people unless they are going to announce something in the next few quarters or sooner.
IMO

[KVM]

Well may be they think success is determined by # of employees you have rather than revenue and profitability.

[GBR]

Yeah, Leatherman is another example of their apparent indifference to the stock price and marketing efforts. If you have an AI project, just call Deloitte. lol

[GBR]

Maybe when this large opportunity surfaces, is when they start aggressively marketing aiWare. Looks like they are ready to market aiWare, with the pending marketing makeover. aiWARE - The world's most powerful AI ecosystem solving your most complex problems. The statement means nothing unless you have some significant development to back it up.

[KVM]

I guess really should take their own advice
I believe it was Scott Leatherman said if you judge the success not by the # of employees working on the project but rather the software.

[GBR]

There should be a difference though. Automate studio basically just a low code tool to use for aiWare. Not really something that they need to market heavily. No code/low code is a dime a dozen.

Pandoslect, suppsed to be the future of work. Supposed to include conversational AI. Plus, Pando in a position that they should be aggressively trying to compensate for Amazon loss. Plus Veritone has a convertible hanging over their head, and they have a couple hundred extra employees to pay. So the sense of urgency should be a little greater now than when Automate Studio release.

Despite the above, Pandoselect a no show, and not even one meaningless PR to offset the C3.AI drubbing. It's like they are just waiting for this large opportunity to surface. Don't seem hungry for attracting new business. At least not publicly. Obviously don't appear concerned about the share price right now, which is absolutely disgusting.

[GBR]

I have asked why they have 700 employees and 34MM in quarterly revenue
No answer whatsoever......
I know they're not stupid, when that disclosure is revealed is my only hope for them at this point.

completely agree.


BOA analyst: What needs to happen either from a Veritone business, aiWARE or PandoLogic business for you guys to get profitable net income?

Chad's response: when you think about our business and how we’re investing, I mean, this year at the tail end of last year, we had just over 500 employees. And today, we’re sitting at just over 700. So we continue to significantly invest in both sales, marketing and technology investment in the company because our strategy is working.

So Chad basically gave a non answer, but I guess the way to interpret it is that this aggressive hiring push is to prepare for some type of opportunity coming down the pyke. Then RS and Zemetra followed up by intimating something coming shortly.

So your comment, "when that disclosure is revealed is my only hope for them at this point". My feeling exactly.

[KVM]

With what happened with Amazon should have really not affected hiring or non hiring by Veri. No way is Pando Achieving this last earnout. So really a wash. Lose revenue but save cash and dilution.

[KVM]

Well same thing happened with launch of Automate Studio. Big pre hoopla and then dud.

[KVM]

IMO you need a much stronger CFO who understands both Veri and the economic conditions and can react and plan accordingly.

[GBR]

When you think about how Amazon put on the brakes, and thinking about how Pandologic responds.

Are Terry Baker and the Pandologic employees incentivized to meet the earnouts? The sellers of Pando get benefit of meeting earnouts. But the sellers of Pando are not the same as the Terry Baker and the employees of Pando, so curious as to how critical it is for Pando employees to meet earnouts.

But lets assume Pando employees and CEO are fully incentivized to meet the earnout. Then don't understand why the Pandoselect product launch was not only delayed, but was a complete non-event when launched. Why wouldn't they want to go into detail on Pandoselect, and how it relates to the future of work. Why doesn't Pando say anything about aiWARE and integration with Pando?

[beni2020]

After all of the harsh dialog I've had with management. And it's been from the very top down...
I have asked why they have 700 employees and 34MM in quarterly revenue
No answer whatsoever......
I know they're not stupid, when that disclosure is revealed is my only hope for them at this point.

[KVM]

I come up with according to 10k about 35 mil. 115 mil x 30%. But seems low since Zemetra said historically Amazon 70 to 80% of pando revenues which I thought were about 60 mil last year. Which would be about 45 mil at 75%.

[KVM]

Does any one recall what Amazon 4q revenue was and total last year?

[KVM]

Could now maybe realign to other veritcles and other things. And not total loss at least save cash and dilution on Pando earnout.

[KVM]

Think in one way a good thing. No longer a "Prime " customer of Veri or should I say Pando. Lol

[GBR]

Well, at least AI thrives in good times and bad.

Amazon Closes, Abandons Plans for Dozens of US Warehouses
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-closes-abandons-plans-dozens-155259786.html

[GBR]

Still puzzled by the Pandoselect "Future of Work Arrives 8/31" Non-event. But they did tweet that Pandoselect was officially launched. So why no PR? Still no thorough description anywhere on what Pandoselect is. Only real substance they point to is the July blog post.

All that comes after back in June they said there would be a PR. Just seems like some kind of back and forth going on behind the scenes. But it's officially launched, so doesn't appear the problem is development issues.

One thought I had is that with Pandoslect having conversational AI, and social media recruiting is getting more popular, then Pandoslect must be tied in with Veritone Voice, Avatar, and Veriverse. Maybe they think Pandologic and its software should be rebranded to tie in with Veritone metaverse offerings.

Another thought I had is that due to the change in the economy and now a focus on cutting costs and increasing efficiency, they may see that it no longer makes sense for Pando to be a separate subsidiary. Could maybe cut costs and streamline operations by bringing Pando in with Veritone.

On another note, I think right now would be a good time for them to really come out with some Veriverse stuff that gets attention. Think they need to get their celebrity synthetic voices and conversational AI out in public for all to see.

This silence is doing nothing for Pando or Veritone as their stock dies. Need to be doing something strategic.

[KVM]

Long long wait until Nov EC to see the #s.

[KVM]

I'll assume Veri got walloped because of Ai3 and economy. But can't see how Ai3 and Veri are similar. Looks like now Ai3 adopting Veri business model. Veri has way more customer and verticle versatility. And Veri in verticles that are kind of recession proof. Ie. Energy, metaverse and gov(fed state and local) and in legal and compliance. So I think got unfairly crushed despite all Veri BS.

[cpeter7]

The new case study out about the bitcoin mining company seems promising. Looks like they delivered the results they were looking for.

[GBR]

Well I guess misery loves company. More pain for C3.AI

[GBR]

Whether for good reasons or bad, it was very awkward to lead up to today with social posts saying the "Future of Work arrives 8/31, and then when 8/31 comes, only have another social media post saying official release of Pandoselect, and not even giving any meaningful description of Pandoselect, or how it relates to the Future of Work. Something happened, again whether good or bad. But this was awkward. Don't know what they gain by doing this. Can only say that as of yesterday, when they said, Future of Work arrives tomorrow, I doubt at the time they were planning to just issue another very vague social media post. Could be just some really bad communication and coordination occurring from within the company.

But a PR would not have been that hard to do, in fact there is a chance that they had a PR already prepared. For whatever reason they just decided to go with a very uninformative post.

[KVM]

Not even going to comment

[GBR]

Welp, I guess this is it.

Today we officially launch pandoSELECT 🎉. This powerful tool combines our best-in-class programmatic job advertising platform with a candidate management dashboard and chat for a deeper level of engagement. Want to learn more? Request a demo:https://t.co/56cGysgWJI pic.twitter.com/jyenW1S2n9

— PandoLogic (@PandoLogic) August 31, 2022

[LYNXMUSIC]

That’s what I get for not following my gut feeling and getting back into this. Down 10k and I’ll just have to pray for a buyout or some miracle innovation that will probably never come.

[cpeter7]

Agreed the losses just keep piling up. Frustrating to say the least.

[GBR]

Blew the Pandoselect PR back in June, missed second quarter earnings and massive pivot on rest of year guidance, which they were very confident of, now blowing the Future of Work PR. Don't know what to say.

[LYNXMUSIC]

Wait, did we really not get any PR? Unbelievable

[GBR]

maybe they want to increase the dramatics by halting the stock.

[GBR]

lol, they better have something today.

[KVM]

No 7 am PR like usual PR time. May be cause "future" they are telepathically revealing it. Lol

[GBR]

unfortunately history shows you will be right.

[KVM]

Well you are right. Just going to be business as usual come Wednesday. Pandoselect just an extension of Pandoiq with the usual Veri hype and nothing to do with "future of work".

[GBR]

Well just seems to me that if you are about to market yourself as having the world's most powerful AI ecosystem, then you ought to have at least some substance behind it. Time for them to get aiware on the investment community radar.

[KVM]

Not far reach to say Deloitte and Veri may be working together on some things. Cortexai running on Aiware. And sounds like could be using some Veri applications.

[KVM]

May be. But somehow don't think will hear anything.

[GBR]

One thing about that post they made on Friday is kind of strange. Purely speculating of course.

But here is the post again:

Say goodbye to the days of manual job posts and drawn-out screening processes. PandoLogic’s latest innovation is coming to help you speed up your recruitment process while helping you land your next great hire. Get ready to step into the future of work with us on 8.31.2022.

When I read the blog post on PandoSelet, it says that PandoSelect "combines our programmatic job advertising platform pandoIQ with a candidate management dashboard and conversational AI (chat) for a deeper level of engagement, saving you time and energy." https://pandologic.com/employers/tech-tools/candidate-engagement-with-pandoselect/

So basically Pandoselect = PandoIQ + dashboard + conversational AI.

My question is, what does this have to do with the "Future of Work"? To me it sounds like recruiting software enhanced with conversational AI. So why should we get ready to step into the "future of work" on 8/31?

Deloitte has a lot of articles concerning AI and the Future of Work. Back in March they had a PR on AIOPS.D, which is part of CortexAI. In they PR they mention the future of work. https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/pages/about-deloitte/articles/press-releases/deloitte-launches-aiops-d.html

This new offering allows clients to focus on high-value processes while Deloitte utilizes autonomous processes to run major business functions, shaping the “future of work.”

So maybe on August 31, we only learn about PandoSelect for Job recruiters. But don't know why Pandologic refers to 8/31 announcement as Future of Work. But it is clear that their partner Deloitte is focused on the Future of Work with its AIOPS.D, which is part of CORTEX.AI.

Maybe PandoSelect is just one aspect of a "Future of Work" initiative that aiWare is involved with its partners. Again, pure speculation. But if there is anything of substance between Deloitte and Veritone seems that an announcement should be forthcoming considering all the hiring Deloitte has done recently on CortexAI.

[KVM]

Wouldn't hold my breath.

[GBR]

yeah at least they now breakout aiWare from Pando in the 10Q, I assume they do this now that the aiWare numbers are not as embarrassing. Hopefully growth in aiWare continues, and this upcoming pandoselect PR really needs to measure up to CS talk of the new AI standard in recruiting developed in partnership with Amazon and Fedex.