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I hope so as well. Either everyone will take it as heartfelt advice from years of experience with presentations and advertising product, or it will be seen as insulting and defenses and rationales go up. It is what it is. NOTHING on TV or the media is real. Even 'reality' clips from surveillance cameras are edited, slowed down, etc. It's like a movie score and editing. When done well you don't think about it, you react to it. The old sayings of judging a book by it's cover and first impressions have a lot of truth in them. A lot of work goes into the text, the message, but if it isn't delivered effectively, no one hears it. Everything is part of the delivery. Adam Chodeck, the interviewer worked real hard to get his job and keep his job. He knows exactly how he sounds and looks on camera and what mood to switch to when delivering the words, while watching the clock in order to cut to the next segment. He knows what to wear to make him look the best he can. How to cut his hair and on and on. He has to in order to keep his job. This is work, this is craft. If you have devoted years of your life to a company and it's products, spend the time to create the best showcase for those things. In this case that means whoever the human is to talk about those things. DK is actually a good choice because then you avoid the problem of man or woman, what age, what complexion, hair color, accent, etc. I just wish as much effort would be focused on him as on the other marketing materials. A darkish, plain suit, reddish tie and a little makeup would do wonders. And a decent camera man. With TV it is often a beginner sent on a remote. He doesn't usually have enough equipment or time to do a studio production shoot. So help him by having lights setup and some camera angles blocked out. That is the PR firms job.
Suggestion for the conference room. Take the existing landscapes and eBay them. Get some ready made 11" x 14" Silver or dark gray metal picture frames. Not white, wood, gold or black, frames. See how many patents you have and slightly enlarge color copies and space them at eye level on one wall. Redact or white out information you don't want too available or just show the seal and the title. We are a tech company with proprietary patents. Show it, prove it. It should be part of the whole marketing effort.
On the rest of the walls larger blowups of parts of the devices that relate to the patents. Not enough to show vital concepts, but enough to show this company does high tech, complicated machines. A list of the fatigue resources would be nice, along with some graphs or charts of CurAegis devices vs the status quo. These would become the fill shots or the panning shots that convey what CurAegis is, instead of a room that could be anywhere for anyone. I would think this would be on a checklist of things to do if you were a PR company planning a marketing campaign. Do they think viewers are going to figure this out? It also wouldn't hurt as far as the board of Directors next get together. Sorry, another frustration with this decades long experiment. Over and out.
I agree that the effort at this stage seems to be getting the idea out quickly and touting the links with recognized names like FitBit, etc. If you are going to use the CEO as the face of the company instead of a marketing/PR/media spokesperson, you gain authenticity, but you are asking a normal person to be a media person. There are skill sets for communication via edited camera interviews. DK did his part pretty good for someone who doesn't make his living in the media, but he could have used better support.
I assume there were bullet points in his notes he checked for the cheddar interview. Better ways to handle that than him looking down to his notes. Please update the conference room with marketing materials or even logos instead of the landscapes. There is a reason politicians, actors and others have an experienced media makeup person prep them before camera interviews. A person talking about health and rest really ought to look rested instead of real. Pro Makeup as viewed thru a video camera does that. Sorry the casual open shirt doesn't suggest action and hard work, it says just got up or glad the day is over. Wear a tie, even if that isn't normal. You do it for the stockholders meeting, do it for the world.
The reason there are marks on the floor for performers is to lock in the camera and lighting. Whoever shot the interview for channel 8 was off their game or couldn't find a chair. That high shot down on DK was not flattering. Another reason for someone at the PR firm to find someone who understands TV production. You want to suggest power, authority, control, you shoot at subject level or slightly below, with a key light and a fill light or reflector. I'm surprised a PR firm doesn't know this stuff or attach importance to it. Channel 8 doesn't care about DK only their guy Adam. HE wasn't shot high or without makeup and a tie. You don't ship product with handwritten labels. You ought to polish every second of video to the same high level of professionalism that is shown in print materials and the canned videos that run in the interviews.
Sorry to be the critic on this, but I know how much work went into the videos played during the interviews and how many hours went into the print materials. It is a shame to not finish the job with proper 'live' segments, instead of making do on the spot. It really is important. It is the difference between national, ready for network broadcast, and not. Someone at the PR firm is not doing their job by insisting on better efforts for this, or CurAegis is not getting their money's worth. Plenty of people in this area who know how to do this right. I hope they do better as the interviews and audience gets bigger. IMO
I hope next time someone has a big monitor with message or his notes on screen or multiple white boards close to the camera. It would also help to review this interview and practice working with the camera. There are good reasons why any regular TV production or commercial has a stylist, makeup and lighting pro on site. Then they could do things like put the earpiece cord behind his shoulder. It's what big buck companies do. Even the mega tech company Apple goes over every detail. Jobs ambled on very causal in a black shirt and jeans, but every bit of every stockholders meeting was gone over. That and he had a giant screen behind him with the absolute best video and photography for his 'one last thing' reveals. It isn't easy, even Microsoft and Apple have embarrassing tech problems at key moments and they had gigantic budgets and teams with time to prepare.
DK seems up for carrying the message. Hopefully there are many more opportunities ahead and the team will polish the whole process. The more he does the better he will get. A good first effort. Had the feeling of an informed, hard working, CEO, but someone at that PR firm has to work harder on the details and presenting a package that looks worthy of a multimillion dollar company on the edge of a billion dollar new industry. They also have to have the buy in of everyone at CurAegis on the importance of a professional appearance in everything that goes to the public. The videos with the interview were good, the packaging and website are good. I just hope everyone is working on making public messaging the best it can be. Very different situation vs one on one sales or boardroom selling.
The fit, finish, packaging, marketing and everything connected with their stores is remarkable. Saving this woman's life might have been a byproduct of the functions of the watch, but everyone who reads that story will get it and remember it. Imagine the cost of trying to advertise that special advantage to the Apple watch and it still would not impact potential customers the way that news story did.
I'd comment on CurAegis marketing for the past couple of years, but what is the point? I'm just hoping this investment starts coughing, spits up some water and suddenly sits up. 2 months to another meeting. I really hope this one is different. Real different.
Well at least one company is going to sell a lot of watches for monitoring health -
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-5683089/Apple-Watch-saved-18-year-old-girls-life-detecting-silent-KIDNEY-FAILURE.html
Very valid concerns. My hope is that the CURA is different than potential competition based on the databases and experts in the field of fatigue/sleep that DK brought into CurAegis very early after the announcement of our device. Others have monitoring watches, but they may not have the specific databases and software that CurAegis has to analysis each individuals data, in real time. I don't think others are collecting 7 days and nights of data to craft an individual pattern. I least I hope not. IF they are I hope they aren't as good as CurAegis is at curing the problem.
The OEMs for heavy equipment have had almost a decade to fix their power/EPA problem. It is not so easy to make a small pump that handles the pressures and delivers the power as the CurAegis pump has proven it can do. I'm sure they have tried everything they can to avoid going to an outside supplier to fix the pump problem. I hope by now, with the prototype in place and tested, they realize they have the answer and it is a matter of deciding on royalties and tooling costs. That's the optimistic theory, but I have to agree that after decades of dead ends it is hard to imagine news of a signed deal. In spite of that I eagerly await the stunning news that all of our time and money has been more than worth it. EOM
Here is a related tech that uses a smartphone on the mattress to study sleep movements. Sounds and vibrations establish a sleep pattern and wake you at the best time. Posting to show the other tech that is going after the CurAegis fatigue warning market-
https://www.sleepcycle.com/how-it-works/
I guess we will see if all the effort of the last couple of years can compete with the major players in the wearable tech market. This does seem like a make or break year for our watch. Others will have or do have similar gadgets. Hopefully the difference is the software and research/expert database DK brought into the CurAegis watch effort. Really want to see major coverage of a breakout deal, like every investor.
The wearable tech in the link below ought to be huge given how many people struggle with obesity and nutrition. Interesting how much money Fitbit put into this-
http://www.businessinsider.com/blood-sugar-tracking-device-diet-health-fitbit-sano-diabetes-weight-loss-2018-1
That's the Irish lad I met in a pub years ago. You are right. I hope someday soon, within a year, I can toast to your daring. I thought I was doing the same thing on a smaller scale back at .74 a share. If we ever do cross the line with this Ox it will be one rag tag band of survivors who earned every dollar of profit.
I'm too cynical at the wrong time and too optimistic at others, but here we are a year into President Trump's term so even Torvec/CurAegis could become what we thought it would be. We are ready to be shocked in a good way. Like a Moon shot.
I think the demand is solid. 3 years ago after the annual meeting I was talking to a man who dealt with earthmoving equipment and he said used earthmovers were more highly valued than new machines because of the stifling effect of the EPA changes. All of that can be cured by the AEGIS pump.
Good points. I think you summed it up nicely. Very early on I liked the DK approach of bringing all the research, knowledge and experts into CRGS as the base to build on.
It's ironic that, as far as I can tell, the other fitbit type devices evolved from heartrate monitors. They might be hardware looking for a mission vs CRGS system which designed hardware to deal with the fatigue problem while incorporating decades of fatigue research. Cart and horse in the correct order.
Apple could become a kind of partner as they move into personal lifestyle spaces. They stopped being just a computer company with the iPhone and as they reach into other areas like cars and the home, this would be a good fit. Any Google, Microsoft, Apple or other megacompany would see the advantage of trying some sort of cooperative effort with tiny CRGS vs trying to duplicate all the effort and knowledge that CRGS has contracts with.
I don't remember Parker Hannifin, but I missed the last 2 stockholder meetings because of medical issues. One thing I do know is if you have arthritic shoulder problems, Ilya Voloshin is the man to see. Very happy with the results.
Years ago when the CRGS watch and fatigue management program was announced at a stockholders meeting, I asked the panel how our watch differed from the Apple and others. DK and the lead engineer gave a good answer on how they were similar in reading thru the skin, but quite different in how they used the information to help the person wearing the watch. I think they said at that time that all such monitoring devices have a problem with tattoos.
If Apple, Aetna and other aren't aware of CRGS, they will be. Then the depth of the CRGS database and research will show the value of our system. That has always been the most impressive part of this to me. The fact that DK saw the long game and had the resources, conviction and salesmanship to bring all of that in house to CurAegis, made this mouse a giant killer. I think it is the key difference and we will soon see if that is correct.
We have all been waiting so long for the blockbuster announcement, but if we are ever going to have one it should be soon and if it is double super news about CAT and the watch, that would be appropriate after this long haul.EOM
I hope you are correct. Focused sales that help companies save money and avoid lawsuits could lead to more sales than a general fitness monitoring watch, or whatever the Apple/Atena watch is. Apple has plenty of hardware failures, so maybe this will be another one for them.
I hope the current sales/marketing people and plan saw this coming and have something to counter, because what Apple wants, Apple often gets. This was a concern very early on with our watch device. Still confident, but we need to see production news and revenue inflow ASAP - https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/14/apple-aetna-secret-meetings-to-bring-apple-watch-to-millions-more.html
Lucky, smart or right place right time, whatever works. Anyone who bought before January 2017 at .50 or less deserve a reward for foresight or optimism. With the updates I don't think we will see those prices again. Considering the history here, that might be crazy, but we have never been this close to actually making money from testing, instead of spending more money for revised prototypes. All of us are tired of waiting. I would welcome the regret of not buying more at .50. Unleash this beast and let's have a survivor party when we get above water again.
Newbies might find it hard to believe, but the old timers who have been hanging on for over a decade are happy if they were clever enough or brave enough to average down to under $3. We must be part Bulldog. There were years where $5 or $7 were normal. That was when Torvec really was a research company with some interesting prototypes.
It's ironic that we can't break a buck when we have unique products with great appeal being tested by several companies. This road should take us to a place where $5 and $7 a share will be based on revenue streams into CurAegis instead of potential sales. I hope.
Another breakthrough for Sleep Apnea would be getting health care insurers to accept the CurAegis data as they do the test center results. The current test is crazy. You are so covered with wires and sensors that you can't really sleep on your side. Plus it is an unfamiliar room with noise, light and warm instead of cool.
Despite all that, you definitely should take the test. CPAP machines are weird, but you will sleep better. Without it, patients literally stop breathing, the oxygen level of the blood is way down and you feel tired all the time. That situation where someone is snoring and they pause, is the body in crisis. Not good.
If our watch can help people prevent heart attacks due to Apnea, as well as monitor issues while awake, many people who aren't in high risk jobs will want to wear one. Besides talking to hospitals for use with newborns or long term patients, I hope the sales people have talked to general practitioners and elder care physicians. If it has a general alarm that an elderly patient could push in case of a fall, that could replace the alarm pendant that most nursing homes have for residents.
Fortune favors the bold. Unfortunately the dam won't break until I sell. Then, usually 2 weeks later, the stock never looks back. After this journey thru the wilderness I just have to be there for the ending. This will end, won't it? I'm sort of joking. President Trump happened, so anything is possible and maybe this decade plus experiment will finally be utilized by CAT and Jet Blue and many others. More positive than negative at this point, but Good Luck to all of us THIS year.
I just checked. Worked fine for me. Running Windows 7 with Windows Defender and using Firefox to go to CurAegis.
I never understood the routine practice of having new doctors on extra long work shifts that no other business does unless it is some kind of emergency. Why would you put doctors on a schedule that has them extremely fatigued? It isn't the battlefield it's your life and you better hope they are just starting a 24 hour shift OR that they are Beta testing a Cur watch -
https://www.yahoo.com/news/rookie-docs-longer-24-hour-shifts-under-rules-141441739.html
It's too painful to recalculate my above water point. It's something over $2, but considering everything else that has happened in the last 10 or 12 years, I'm upping it to $3. NOT complaining, because I feel more confident about getting back to the months of bouncing around from $5 to $7, than I have in a long, long, time. After this election, anything is possible, but DK's roadmap seems to be working so might be a great year.
I was thinking during a Pampers commercial that any parent would be thrilled to have a better handle on their baby's sleep cycles and any other advise the database might be able to give them about their child. It might also be a constant monitoring system that could give them the fastest alert if there was a medical issue during everyone's sleep time. I hope they have some efforts focused on this. If CurAegis could do this, It would be a huge help for new parents. Seems like something Hospitals would be using for all ages, but perhaps even more so for newborns.
Love the CAT research. Very encouraging.
Apple can of course hire engineers, but the major difference between CurAegis watch and others is not just the way it collects data, but the depth of the analysis of that data. DK was brilliant in realizing that all that data needed the best experts in the field of fatigue, sleep, bio rhythms, etc. and he locked them up early on, along with their databases. THAT is the difference that Apple or anyone else will have a problem duplicating at this point. Much easier for them to make a big offer, IF they want to get into this area.
Love the reasoning. I think you are right about Fitbit and Apple. The value isn't really in the device, it is the database and formulas behind it. I could see Apple making a strong play for the watch part of CurAegis as part of their Apple automated lifestyle, from your car to your house to your personal health.
Apparently the 'tone' is important so I guess a dual personality would need counseling about their other self. Meanwhile companies and governments can't seem to keep employees from surfing porn for hours at a time. The overlords of that technology are way ahead of themselves. The whole thing seems absurd, but there are plenty of people/governments that really, really, want to incorporate the voice stress data, along with facial recognition and location data, into some kind of blanket monitoring. Minority Report isn't just a movie for some. I think CurAegis tech is actually a good thing for individuals in stressful situations. Like seatbelts, face masks, etc., so it isn't like the tech I mentioned. Some will see it that way, so how CurAegis presents and sells the watch is a vital part of making it a success. On the other hand if it SELLS, I don't care how they do it.
Oh, I agree. I don't think their approach and their technology is as good. It is pretty awful considering they are monitoring 'stress' levels in speech and using location data. It is much closer to Orwell's warning about Big Brother than a useful tool to monitor your health warnings.
I only post it to show that at least one other company is doing something in the area of concern for employee performance. They actually make the case for CurAegis, which doesn't have some of the negatives of their system.
Our competition is up and running in the UK-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4121612/Companies-fit-thousands-staff-wearable-trackers-follow-movements-night-day.html
I will add to your enthusiasm for the watch by saying that I really liked the fact that Kaplan went after the research resources and large industry clients at the same time the watch and it's special software was being developed. He didn't just look at the market, but thought of a way to convince them with all the backup studies and experts that support the device. That is different. In a company full of engineers the focus has been primarily on the device. They made some great ones, but the compelling reasons for each device came up short for any OEM. The government interest seemed like a shortcut, but unless you are Lockheed, it is a swamp.
Looks like CAT made a big bet that didn't happen and are cutting back, so maybe it will take longer for them to buy the pump. All signs say they should, but probably not until the economy worldwide revives. Given that and increased litigation everywhere, maybe the watch is ready to be utilized or even mandated by some segment of industry. That would be sweet. Seems like a better grand strategy for this device. Let's hope the team, the watch and the timing are spot on. EOM
Good to know. It looks like a whole different approach to this invention and this market. As a long time stock holder I'd love to see this become a revenue monster. I agree that the targeted market participation of the watch and the plan for marketing it, seems very different than previous auto clients. I don't disagree with any of your points.
If the Iso-Torque was a product, it wasn't ready for the high performance cars it was designed for. It would be nice if they could find a smaller front wheel drive market, but as Kaplan said this isn't the time for that. Would love to see a home run for the watch and a OEM interest in that prototype pump that was mentioned months ago.
It isn't a product till they show revenue from it. Isn't the watch still in Beta test? I hope they do well with it and we can watch the watch push the stock above $3. Seems like we should know before 2017, considering how long it has been being tested by potential clients.
Briefly Torvec did have an automotive product for sale, the Iso-Torque for GM cars. I think Cameros, Corvettes and maybe Cadillac. Under normal use the differential would have been fine, but the horsepower race of 500+ horsepower in street cars made them withdraw the product. The impact of a popped clutch subjected too many parts to unacceptable stress. Better funding, more exotic metals, etc. might have enabled it to pass, but too much money for too small an aftermarket. That's my theory. It is a shame. It should have gone on to make a lot of cars, especially front wheel drive, safer and better performing, but seems dead now. I hope the pump does not go down the same path. EOM
Well it is kind of like being in the longest ball game in history. Our team has been waiting to get a turn at bat and score for over 15 years, so the mind wanders a bit.
I'm not 'fixated' on autodrive. I think it is bizarre, but there certainly are a lot of people and money behind it. Until we get SOME kind of news on any CurAegis technology making it to retail, seems like these auto developments might be worth sharing. EVERY automaker is working on it. They look at buying trends, demographics and they all want to be in front of the transpod whatever, because the number of individually owned cars is going down in the coming years. At least that is the trend and they are planning accordingly.
It sure is 'interesting' times. Notice in this link that the first photo shows the trailer truck in the passing lane. Perhaps that was before the driver turned it over to the truck to drive itself.
Goes 120 miles on autopilot, then the driver takes control to back it up to the loading gate. I guess the idea of special lanes for software driven vehicles is passé. I wonder if two autodrive trucks have 2 mph difference, will the miles long pass take even longer than current human drivers?
http://interestingengineering.com/self-driving-truck-makes-its-debut-delivery/
I think you summed it up pretty well.
Agree, but it is interesting on what factors are 'driving' this. If you back to the World of Tomorrow in the 1960s, GM and others foresaw this idea, even though they had no idea about EPS. Today the trends are for less and less car ownership. More urban populations that hate the whole idea of owning a car.
Uber is a big investor because they simply want to get rid of all the instant labor they got from people who needed a flexible job and who had a car. As soon as they got a lot of capital they started cutting pay rates for their drivers. This is the ultimate goal and they are well on their way. Tesla and every other car maker is running hard to be in the lead for selling these pod cars. They see the sales model that made them fading away. The only upside to me is the fact that there millions of people who should be in one of these cars starting today. Less chance of killing themselves or us.
I hope CurAegis is so successful with the trial period that the test companies are ready to buy the product to the point that we see a Holiday announcement about actual sales. Even the passengers in an autopod could need a CurAegis watch to alert them to a weaken state before they go into a big meeting. Greed and ambition might be a more motivating factor than health for a lot of people.
I totally agree about being a passenger with no human at the wheel. After riding motorcycles for 27+ years, there are very few drivers I know who do enough checking their mirrors, make a pass correctly, or follow the right distance, to make me comfortable.
I wonder if this will be another hydrogen fuel dilemma of not really working until a majority of cars are fully auto. I have eyesight on a Subaru that beeps off in whiteouts, heavy spray or driving into the sun. I guess the EPS info on Tesla, etc. never gets interrupted, like going thru a tunnel or sitting in a tunnel.
Meanwhile it is happening on farms. They better have the incline angles and load shifting down pat or there will be even more farm accidents.
http://www.jsonline.com/story/money/business/2016/10/18/case-ih-developing-driverless-tractors/92355244/
I hope there is a very aggressive sales/marketing/promotion plan at work right NOW, because THIS is happening faster than everyone thinks-
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/10/19/all-tesla-vehicles-being-produced-now-have-full-self-driving-hardware.html
I hope you are right. Just pointing out that there is more progress on this than many thought.
Meanwhile CAT is all over the place. People talking about commodity prices and CAT expanding for a market that didn't develop. Nothing mentioned about the hobbled CAT equipment because of the lack of a Torvec pump. Some info here - http://www.bullfax.com/?q=node-how-caterpillars-big-bet-backfired
He better hurry up. As strange as it seems, auto driving is going to be all around us much sooner than we think. Uber started in Pittsburgh and they hired a lot of Carnegie researchers. They are testing auto driving Uber cars in Pittsburgh right now. The thinking is IF they can make it work there, with the geography and weather, it can work anywhere.
Driverless trucks completed a long road trip in Europe this year. Trucking companies can't wait for this to be accepted. No down time for sleeping and no benefit packages. It seems impossible, but they are close.