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Telbivudine Approved in Switzerland for Chronic Hepatitis B
This is great news for all those suffering from the Hep B disease. IMHO, China needs to push this approval hard. I have several coworkers in our Shanghai office whom suffer from this illiness.
Thursday September 21, 1:15 am ET
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Sept. 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Idenix Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: IDIX - News), announced today that the Swissmedic has approved telbivudine as a new treatment for chronic hepatitis B (CHB) in compensated patients with evidence of viral replication and active liver inflammation. Telbivudine is a single pill taken orally, once-a-day, with or without food to suppress replication of hepatitis B virus.(1)
We are committed to improving the therapeutic options for patients with viral diseases with new drugs, such as telbivudine," said Jean-Pierre Sommadossi, chairman and chief executive officer of Idenix. "For Idenix, this is a major milestone as it is the first approval of Idenix's first drug candidate, telbivudine, in a European country, just 6 years after it entered clinical development. Having achieved this milestone is an inflection point in Idenix's evolution to a fully integrated pharmaceutical company."
A new drug application was submitted by Idenix with the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in late 2005 and is currently under review. Regulatory applications were submitted by Novartis in 2006 in a number of regions including the European Union, Canada, Australia, Switzerland, Taiwan, South Korea and China seeking marketing approval of telbivudine for the treatment of CHB. Telbivudine will be called SEBIVO® in Switzerland.
Safety Information About Telbivudine
The diverse nature and rate of occurrence of adverse events were similar between telbivudine-treated patients and lamivudine-treated patients. The most common adverse events for telbivudine and lamivudine, regardless of attributability, were upper respiratory infection, headache, fatigue and nasopharyngitis.
Grade 3-4 serum ALT elevations were more common in lamivudine-treated patients compared to telbivudine after week 24. Grade 3-4 creatine kinase (CK) elevations were more common with telbivudine compared to lamivudine by week 52.
Severe acute exacerbations of hepatitis B have been reported in patients who have discontinued anti-hepatitis B therapy. Hepatic function should be monitored closely with both clinical and laboratory follow-up for at least one year in patients who discontinue anti-hepatitis B therapy. If appropriate, resumption of anti-hepatitis B therapy may be warranted.
About Chronic Hepatitis B
Approximately 350 million people worldwide are living with CHB,(2) a virus which affects the liver, and is 50 to 100 times more infectious than the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).(2) Hepatitis B is the second most common cause of cancer after smoking,(2) and each year an estimated 1.2 million people worldwide die from hepatitis B-related chronic liver disease.(3)
Idenix/Novartis Collaboration
Telbivudine is being developed in collaboration between Idenix and Novartis Pharma AG under a development and commercialization arrangement established in May 2003, along with another hepatitis B clinical product candidate, valtorcitabine. The collaboration arrangement further provides that Idenix and Novartis will co-promote telbivudine and valtorcitabine and other product candidates that Novartis has licensed, upon successful development and approval, in the US, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK. Novartis holds the exclusive license to commercialize telbivudine and valtorcitabine in the rest of the world. In March 2006, Novartis expanded its collaboration with Idenix to include valopicitabine, an investigational agent for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C.
Re: Overview of HCV Therapies in Development
Dew, very nice summary and very much appreciated. Thank you,
Rich
IDIX -
Dew, what (if any) do you make of the recent information provided by a poster identified as "magkfrog" on the Yahoo message board?
Best regards
rw
Dew et al... GTCB
Sincere congratulations for a great job of managing your risk reward. Congrats to all the longs who held on to those shares and picked some up below $1.
Have a great weekend!
GTCB - EMEA update????
Perhaps I missed something but shouldn't GTCB know the results of thier appeal?
TIA
IDIX...at least we are moving north. Have a great weekend!
Re IDIX
I asked gordon939 on the YMB and was told "There is no link. It was research entered into Thompson FirstCall. (you gotta pay to play)". I guess I'm not surprised, YMB posters are for the most part not very helpful (IMHO).
rich
Re IDIX and YMB posters
I rarely bother with YMB anymore. I just cannot tolerate the mud slinging, the BS posts, the day trades, the shorts and the cheerleaders. JMHO
IDIX....I guess a buy in at an average of $11.45 was poor judgment on my part. RTQ is $7.94 at present. Twelve months and a positive ruling by the FDA should change the prospect of this issue long term. What I find amazing is that some investors might still be shorting this issue at current the price.
VRTX...The current valuation is $3.99 Billion. Isn't this issue a little too rich or have I missed something?
Best Regards
IDIX....dido for me as well. I sold "some" of my SOFO for a great return (purchased last December) and purchased more IDIX at $10.07
Have agreat weekend
IDIX...purchased more at $10.89
Toddean & 5K,
I've heard many rumors over the years including one where IBM was going to buy Dell (many years ago). I have very little faith in these types of rumors and do not make my investment decisions based on such hearsay. If a buyout happens, my hope is it will be at a decent PPS which for the long time shareholders whom have been very patient over the years.
Best regards to you both.
Hi urche,
Good luck to you also. I purchased more this AM and honestly believe this is grossly oversold.
This reminds me of AMLN last year at $14-15, now at $47-49.
IDIX....In at $11.50 for 2000 shares. Will added more as/if price goes down. Anyone else buy today?
BR
Dew...Congrats!
The continued sell off of IDIX is overdone IMHO. Are you considering addition to your position?
Rich
IDIX......I almost pulled the trigger today at $11.85. Then I decided to wait until later this afternoon to see what happened at the end of day. I'm a hopeful buyer soon and prepared to jump in at this level.
Hey PCF,
If SOFO YMB continues to attract the nasty vermin (day traders), we will at least have a good place to move to. I did hear you mention and look forward to our next meeting during the summer months, just let me know when you guys decide to take the afternoon off.
BR
GENR
anyone...what do you make of the recent "insider" purchases by GENR executives?
TIA
OT-SOFO
Interesting activity today with very unusual high volume. This issue seems to have attracted a lot of attention lately with perhaps the insider purchasing activity.
I will be attending the Annual Shareholders meeting next Wednesday in Madison WI, and will provide commentary on I-Hub board created for SOFO.
regards
Here are my personal thoughts on Sonic Foundry (all IMHO) as of today.
Sales growth from quarter to quarter has been very encouraging. SOFO continue to improve on many different levels.
SOFO is no longer just a “hardware” company. They now are incurring services revenue that is also growing nicely but need to continue.
Valuation play. I feel that the market capitalization for SOFO today (30-40 Million) is very appealing. With the estimated growth rate that SOFO management foresees and has discussed on their recent quarterly update, I continue to believe the future of SOFO is very positive.
Management reiterated recently that they still expect to reach $15 Million in sales for 2006. They had a chance recently to revise these numbers down after a “slow” first quarter, but instead made comments alluding to tremendous growth/project prospects in the upcoming quarters.
I like Mediasite. It is a very simple tool and I believe has tremendous long term value as more individual in the Educational and Government market segments. I believe the other market of tremendous growth lie outside the US territories.
The recent “insider” purchasing by the CEO I believe is a strong positive sign of things to come. I am a simple Midwest individual. A personal investment of $100,000 is a lot of money, at least to my thinking.
If you look at the % amount of insider ownership, they own I believe 17%. Another 22% of the shares are held by Institutional & Mutual Fund Owners. Neither of these groups has sold one share.
Longer term, 12-36 months out, I see SOFO as a strong buyout candidate. The value attached to the buyout is uncertain at this juncture, all depends on how well their sales and service contracts grow and the acceptance of www.MediaSite.com
RW
RE ADH
My thinking as well. I watched it reach $0.95 for a while, then popped back up to $1.05. Will wait & see.
OXGN
I like insider buying!
CITRON JOEL TOMAS (Director)
18,400 @ $3.91
1,600 @ $3.92
OT - SOFO
http://post.messages.yahoo.com/bbs?.mm=FN&action=m&board=9029897&tid=sfo&sid=9029897...
02/27/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 6,000 Direct Purchase at $1.23 per share. $7,380
02/21/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 11,000 Direct Purchase at $1.20 per share. $13,200
02/15/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 7,900 Direct Purchase at $1.13 - $1.15 per share. $9,062
02/14/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 15,400 Direct Purchase at $1.10 - $1.15 per share. $17,002
02/10/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 25,000 Direct Purchase at $1.04 - $1.05 per share. $26,002
02/09/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 10,000 Direct Purchase at $1.02 - $1.04 per share. $10,002
02/09/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 21,095 Direct Purchase at $1 - $1.01 per share. $21,002
Recent Insider purchases for SOFO
Total shares purchased in last month 96,395 ($103,586)
02/27/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 6,000 Direct Purchase at $1.23 per share. $7,380
02/21/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 11,000 Direct Purchase at $1.20 per share. $13,200
02/15/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 7,900 Direct Purchase at $1.13 - $1.15 per share. $9,062
02/14/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 15,400 Direct Purchase at $1.10 - $1.15 per share. $17,002
02/10/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 25,000 Direct Purchase at $1.04 - $1.05 per share. $26,002
02/09/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 10,000 Direct Purchase at $1.02 - $1.04 per share. $10,002
02/09/06 BUINEVICIUS, RIMAS Chairman 21,095 Direct Purchase at $1 - $1.01 per share. $21,002
1st Qtr 2006 summary as I see it:
Cash down $0.854 M (not so good)
Receivables down $0.576 M compared to Q4 2005 (not so good)
Inventories up $0.184 M compared to Q4 2005 (not so good)
Accounts payable down $0.441 M compared to Q4 2005 (good)
Accrued liabilities down $0.339 M compared to Q4 2005 (good)
Total current liabilities down $0.638 compared to Q4 2005 (good)
Total cash & equiv down to $3,417 M (a growing concern)
The question I have is does SOFO foresee a significant financing deal in 2006
Sonic Foundry Reports First Quarter Results for Fiscal 2006
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/060202/lath044a.html?.v=1
MADISON, Wis., Feb. 2 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Sonic Foundry® Inc. (Nasdaq: SOFO - News), a leader in automated rich media communications technology, announced results for its first quarter of fiscal 2006. Financial and company highlights for the first quarter include:
* Revenues increase 18 percent year-to-year. For the first quarter of fiscal 2006, Sonic Foundry reported revenues of $1.9 million, an increase of 18 percent from $1.6 million reported for the first quarter of fiscal 2005. During this seasonally slow period, the company reported a net loss of $1.6 million or five cents per share for the first quarter of fiscal 2006 compared to $1.4 million or five cents per share in Q1-2005. Current period results include non-cash expense of $182 thousand related to a new accounting rule change requiring companies to record the cost of issuing stock options.
* Multi-unit sales grow as customer base rapidly expands. The customer base at the end of the first quarter of 2006 was 491, a 79 percent increase over the first quarter last fiscal year. The company reported multi-unit sales in key verticals including education (University of Cincinnati and Victoria University), government (Maryland House of Delegates) and corporate (Raytheon). Other new customers include Mutual of Omaha, Merck, Carnegie Mellon and the Tiger Woods Learning Center.
* Sonic Foundry featured in Dell Intelligent Classroom. As previously announced, Sonic Foundry recently became a supplier to the Dell education channel with a significant role in Dell's Intelligent Classroom marketing and sales initiative. In anticipation of this new initiative, first quarter sales and marketing efforts were focused on creating and planning new marketing programs as well as conducting initial sales training and customer visits with Dell personnel. This new distribution channel is expected to diversify Sonic Foundry's reach, especially in education sales, both to the higher education and K-12 markets.
* EX Server ships late in Quarter. Shipment of EX server software occurred later than anticipated in the quarter and therefore provided no significant contribution to revenues. However, the new offering has attracted large enterprise customers who are interested in deploying the highly scalable, secure rich media software platform. As such, the company expects larger contributions from server software license sales in the future and may potentially see dramatic swings in future sequential quarter results due to full scale enterprise deployments based on EX.
* Cash flow breakeven expected during fiscal 2006. As reported at fiscal 2005 year end, the company projected a seasonally slow quarter for the fiscal 2006 first quarter, with a significant pick up in business expected for the balance of fiscal 2006. The company believes it remains on pace to achieve breakeven operations some time in fiscal 2006
and has sufficient working capital to reach breakeven operations.
* Customer support revenues more than double. Customer support revenue represents the portion of fees charged for Mediasite SmartServe service contracts as well as training and installation services. In the first quarter of fiscal 2006, customer support revenue was $415,000, up from $189,000 in the first quarter of fiscal 2005. The increase was due primarily to support contracts on new Mediasite sales and renewals. At December 31, 2005, $1.1 million of unearned revenue was recorded for service and support contracts to be recognized in upcoming quarters.
* Gross margins improve from the same period one year earlier. For the first fiscal quarter of 2006, gross margins increased to 70 percent, up from 66 percent in the first quarter of 2005. Mediasite customer support revenues and server license fees contributed to the increase. The company expects margins for fiscal 2006 to be in the low 70's percent range.
* Improved search capabilities. Sonic Foundry introduced Mediasite.com, a website that aggregates public presentations created with Mediasite systems. Users can search for specific content in one location with a simple search phrase. Throughout the first quarter of fiscal 2006, the company's advanced R&D group incorporated unique ways in which data can
be indexed. Users are now employing these advanced search capabilities to drill further down into rich media communications that have been difficult to find, even through the use of traditional search engines like Google, Yahoo or MSN. Based on the initial positive reaction of customers, the company expects this initiative will lead to new products and services that further advantage the customer base with the Mediasite platform. Development efforts are now under way that provide for new automated metadata extraction and archiving technology, specific customizations and new hosting services.
"Over the last three years, we have evangelized our Mediasite product line as a new form of communication technology geared specifically to information providers," said Rimas Buinevicius, chairman and CEO of Sonic Foundry. "We've found that whether it's the professor, CEO, reporter, health care provider, product manager, lawyer or engineer, they all have one thing in common: a fundamental need to share knowledge and information quickly, and above all easily, with those that seek it. What makes Sonic Foundry unique is our ability to adapt the early ideas of television, telephony and audio/video production and meld them into an entirely new form of communication that is changing the way people deliver their message. This is still just the beginning of what we expect will turn into thousands of devices capturing and transmitting information for millions of hours of content, all accessible on a distributed network basis."
Sonic Foundry will host a Webcast today to discuss its first quarter 2006 results at 10:00 a.m. CT/11 a.m. ET. It will use Mediasite to Webcast the presentation for both live and on-demand viewing. To access the presentation, go to www.sonicfoundry.com. An archive of the Webcast will be available for 30 days.
About Sonic Foundry®, Inc.
Founded in 1991, Sonic Foundry (Nasdaq: SOFO - News) is a technology leader in the emerging rich media communications marketplace, providing enterprise solutions and services that link an information driven world. Sonic Foundry is changing the way organizations communicate via the Web and how people around the globe receive vital information needed for work, professional advancement, safety and education. The company's integrated Webcasting and Web presentation solutions are trusted by Fortune 500 companies, education institutions and government agencies for a variety of critical communication needs. Sonic Foundry is based in Madison, Wis. For more information about Sonic Foundry, visit the company's Website at www.sonicfoundry.com.
Certain statements contained in this news release regarding matters that are not historical facts may be forward-looking statements. Because such forward-looking statements include risks and uncertainties, actual results may differ materially from those expressed in or implied by such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include, but are not limited to, uncertainties pertaining to continued market acceptance for Sonic Foundry's products, its ability to succeed in capturing significant revenues from media services and/or systems, the effect of new competitors in its market, integration of acquired business and other risk factors identified from time to time in its filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
GTCB - apropos Insider buying....Maybe the management team had a "feeling" things were not going their way. Then again, maybe not.
BR
GTCB - I voted for answer "b". This is a tough day for most of us.
I'm heading for Guangzhou for a customer audit of two Glucosamine facilities. The recent headlines about Glucosamine & CS are not surprising. It will be very interesting to see if this impacts sales of G&CS in the year to come.
Best Regards,
RW
PS DEW...Hope you Dad is doing well.
Dew...Hope everything turns out OK and sincerely hope it's not too serious.
BR Rich
GTCB
I would like to purchase more shares but frankly this is or appears very suspicious to me. I'll pass for now, thank you. For 18 months this thing has been like a yoyo. Good luck!
Rich
Genentech's 4Q Earnings Match Expectations
Wednesday January 11, 1:00 am ET
By Michael Liedtke, AP Business Writer
Genentech's Fourth-Quarter Earnings Match Analyst Expectations
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060111/earns_genentech.html?.v=2
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Genentech Inc.'s ability to develop a series of breakthrough drugs has helped establish it as one of the nation's smartest companies. Coming off one of the best years in its history, the biotechnology bellwether must now tackle a different kind of challenge -- managing investors' rising expectations.
Wall Street's response to the South San Francisco-based company's fourth quarter earnings, released Tuesday, suggests that won't be an easy task.
The company's profit rose 64 percent, yet it still wasn't good enough to propel its high-flying stock because of Genentech's recent history of surpassing expectations.
Net income for the three months ended in December totaled $339.2 million, or 32 cents per share. That compared with a profit of $206.6 million, or 19 cents per share, at the same time in 2004.
Fourth-quarter revenue hit $1.89 billion, a 44 percent increase from the previous year.
If not for accounting expenses unrelated to its ongoing operations, Genentech said it would have earned 34 cents per share to equal the average estimate among analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial.
It marked the first time in a year that Genentech's quarterly earnings didn't exceed analyst expectations by least 4 cents per share.
That succession of pleasant surprises helped boost Genentech's stock price by 70 percent last year, adding $40 billion in shareholder wealth as the company overtook Amgen Inc. as the biotech's most valuable company.
The latest results were released after the stock market closed. Genentech's shares gained 68 cents to close at $93.34 on the New York Stock Exchange, then shed $2.39, or 2.6 percent, in extended trading.
Arthur Levinson, Genentech's chief executive, painted a rosy outlook for analysts during a Tuesday conference call, predicting the company will be able to balance Wall Street's desire for short-term financial growth while continuing to develop new drugs that often require years of expensive testing.
"We believe the scientific opportunities before us are as exciting as they have ever been," Levinson said.
In a bullish sign, Levinson said Genentech plans to hire about 1,400 additional employees this year, a 15 percent increase from its current work force of 9,500 worldwide. Genentech added roughly 1,900 workers last year, a 25 percent increase from 2004.
The earnings growth during 2006 is likely to slacken slightly from 2005's pace on a so-called "pro-forma" basis -- a calculation that strips out accounting items that don't affect the ongoing operations. This earnings approach is favored by many investors.
Genentech also excluded stock option expenses of 15 cents to 17 cents per share from its 2006 forecast, which envisions an earnings increase of 35 percent to 45 percent. In 2005, Genentech's pro-forma earnings rose by 54 percent.
Based on Tuesday's estimates, Genentech's pro-forma earnings this year will range between $1.73 and $1.86 per share. The average estimate among analysts had been $1.18 per share, according to Thomson Financial.
Genentech's recent prosperity largely stems from sales of its flagship product, the non-Hodgkin's lymphoma drug Rituxan, and a relative newcomer called Avastin that has been approved to treat the sickest colon cancer patients.
Fourth-quarter sales of Rituxan totaled $484 million, a 13 percent increase from the comparable 2004 period.
Meanwhile, fourth-quarter sales of Avastin increased 89 percent to $359 million. Genentech's management is hoping to win regulatory approval to allow Avastin to treat lung and breast cancers, a breakthrough that would provide a significant sales stimulus. As it was, Avastin's sales for all of 2005 more than doubled to $1.1 billion.
Under the accounting principles mandated by securities regulators, Genentech earned $1.28 billion, or $1.18 per share, on revenue of $6.63 billion. In 2004, the company's profit totaled $784.6 million, or 73 cents per share, on revenue of $4.62 billion.
http://www.gene.com
Open positions @ SOFO
by: rwwine (40/M/Milwaukee, WI) 01/08/06 09:46 am
Msg: 25113 of 25113
According to Sonic's website, they have the following open positions:
Software Engineer - Rich Media Systems
NET Web Developer
Software Engineer - Web Development
Number of employees stands at 63
Over the holidays I watched a presentation by Sean Brown (SOFO) on October 21, 2005 and thought it was excellent. It helped me better understand the Mediasite functions & capabilities. During Sean's presentation, he mentioned Scott McNealy’s presentation (of Sun Microsystems). When I tried to access this presentation on the “Mediasite website” this last week, I received a message saying "Your search for Scott McNealy returned no results". This was rather frustrating since Rimas made a point that with Google, you had to click 5-6 times before your could find the presentation you were hunting for. At the end of the day and I found the presentation at Educause website (not Mediasite), maybe 20 clicks.
http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?page_id=9337&bhcp=1
http://fp3demo.mediasite.com/fp3demo/Viewer/NoPopupRedirector.aspx?peid=9955469f -0425-4b11-abfd-911f4396760e&shouldResize=False
I also found that when I attempted to send SOFO comments about their Mediasite website, I could not get confirmation that my email went to either the SOFO contact page or the Mediasite contact page.
In all fairness, Mediasite is classified as a "beta" program which will improve over time.
Best Regards,
Rich
GTCB
My nagging (minor) ongoing concern with the GTCB management team is why they collectively own so little of this company, especially at such a low pps.
If each executive purchased on the open market say 20 to 100k shares, I think this would send the investment community a "strong" positive message.
Happy New Year!!
Thanks Dew for your hard work.
Best Regards
Re: Pfizer survey
FWIW, I voted for "f) None of the above.". In the industry I service, Nutritional Supplements, it is widely known that CoQ10 supplementation should be strongly promoted for all those that take statin type drugs. Statin drugs inhibit the human bodies’ ability to natural synthesizes CoQ10. CoQ10 is considered an excellent supplement focused on improving "heart health". For more information, please see the following link.
http://www.atdonline.org/pdf/CoQ10-HeartDisease.pdf
I feel it is feasible that Kaneka, a Japanese company who is currently building an $80 million factory in Pasadena, Texas, may position themselves with PFE to promote a new product, a combination therapy if you will where Lipitor/CoQ10 could be lunched as a new "patented" product.
For more on Kaneka, please see the following link.
http://www.nutraingredients.com/news-by-health/news.asp?id=53873&k=kaneka-further-expands
FWIW, I sell sythetic Coenzyme Q10 USP grade manufactured by Daewoong in Korea. Going price today is $1350/kg.
Best Regards,
Rich
Road to Breakeven
Posted on YMB. After I carefully review of the information that Sonic Foundry management recently provided, I have summarized my opinion regarding future earns as outlined below.
If you extrapolate the two lines in the graph titled “Road to Breakeven” which is 31 minutes into the Fiscal 2005 Investor Presentation, you “could” come to the conclusion that if the slope of these two lines (GM/Employee & Expense/Employee) remain the same, that breakeven “should” occur in Q3 of 2006.
My best guess (SWAG) based on this assumption is we should see the following financial results for the upcoming quarters.
Q1 of 2006 -0.02/eps
Q2 of 2006 -0.01/eps
Q3 of 2006 0.00/eps (breakeven)
Q4 of 2006 0.01/eps
Therefore, Fiscal 2006 net result should be -0.02/eps.
Agree?
OT - SOFO
Dew,
Thanks for the additional color which I placed on the I-Hub board recently created to discuss the company’s prospects. Good, bad or indifferent, we need these types of opinions to keep balanced.
http://www.investorshub.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=8790749
Thank you
Article apropos Mediasite.com
Thanks to IAM5000 on the YMB for the article find
http://wistechnology.com/article.php?id=2531
Sonic Foundry creates search engine for 7,000 expert video presentations
Eric Kleefeld • Published 12/07/05
Madison, Wis. — Sonic Foundry premiered this week a new Mediasite portal, venturing into what they believe is an untapped audience on the Internet interested in multimedia presentations featuring expert knowledge.
The site features direct links to presentations by users of the company’s rich media software and server tools, which combine audio and video content with other media sources slideshows and text. The site debuted with almost 7,000 presentations, totaling over 5,000 hours of content. Presentations include such subjects as bird flu, distance education, law and politics.
“Most of the glitz you find with entertainment content, or music downloads, or even video iPods, can only focus on Hollywood content,” said CEO Rimas Buinevicius. “We feel that there’s an underserved market here, with information technology that’s out there.”
The site is relatively inexpensive for the company to maintain, in that it does not actually host or stream video content. Instead, a program scans the Web for Mediasite presentations, and content providers also submit their entries to Sonic Foundry, who checks to make sure the links work and the content is not inappropriate before entering it into the search engine.
Buinevicius said using on-demand delivery for video content, estimated at an average 60 megabytes for a single hour, can be less expensive than live webcasts.
“There is a huge cost associated with live webcasts, that gets you into extremely expensive bandwidth to meet the needs of instantaneous communications when you go out and do, let’s say, one of the big online live webcasts,” he said. “Rather than doing that, on-demand spreads the cost of the bandwidth out so that it’s almost no different than your normal Internet connection.”
Buinevicius said costs for the site would initially be offset by ads, and the company could also negotiate for some percentage on any future offerings that content providers wish to present on a subscription or pay-per-view basis. Additionally, the site would also function as a promotion of the Mediasite presentation technology, though it is too early for Buinevicius to make any prediction on the returns.
"Mediasite.com is interesting and offers a broad spectrum of how the technology is being used,” said David Simpson, director of digital media for Florida State University Academic and Professional Program Services, which uses Sonic Foundry’s technology. “I see value in the site in it being a resource for individuals to view other presentations of interest."
Additional color apropos SOFO lastest CC
CC impressions:
by: DewDiligence 12/08/05 03:58 am
Msg: 25039 of 25039 YMB
I just don’t see why mediasite.com is all that big a deal for SOFO from a business standpoint. In listening to the CC last week, I thought all the attention devoted to the new website was a smokescreen so management wouldn’t have to spend much time talking about the FY2006 sales and earnings forecasts.
I was also disappointed that they did not address the unusual financing transaction.
The questions in the Q&A sounded scripted—I would much prefer a conventional kind of CC where investors and analysts ask their questions live.
JMHO, FWIW
pCf,
I'm comfortable with SOFO performance this last quarter and didn't have an issue with there achievement this year. Last year Rimas said they would reach the 10 Million mark in 2005, but I think that was an unrealistic expectation. It takes time to hire & train sales personnel and in my experience typically takes 12-18 months to see the results. In general, I think it may be incredibly difficult to grow as fast as SOFO has while trying to balance both their resources and cash flow while attempting to please all us inventories.
Take good care!
Rich