In the Example of INOV, did it run like this one has this week?
No. INOV used to be BMII, which did a 1:5000 r/s after they'd issued about 20 billion shares. BMII had a few small runs early on, but I don't think anyone (in this case, not even the odious CEO Blaggy) made big money. After the two splits, it went nowhere but down.
I was scared of a reverse split ealry on, but is that really a likely event now?
Yes. Even the most "conservative" here believe there are billions of shares outstanding. If Urbie wants to be taken seriously by financiers who don't want to do PIPES, he's gotta prune the o/s way back.