Last week, Bloomberg forced Spooz to pull down the mention of the deal from Spooz's website using their legal department to bludgeon Spooz into being silent. Bloomberg is the 800 lb gorilla and, as everyone knows, when you are caged with an 800 lb gorilla, you sit pretty much where the 800 lb gorilla says to sit & move pretty much when it tells you to move. Thats what happened as regards the pulling down of the PR that told us about the Bloomberg deal.
OK, so segway up a week. Here we have Paul et al telling everybody that they do have a large client (hint hint, wink wink). We get figures: $400/month & 1200 seats target number. We get a timeframe for recognition of a minimum expected subscriber base from the unnamed large client. And we get the explanation for why the phones had the trouble they did last week.
In effect, Paul looks like he has intentionally circumvented the limitations placed on him by the 800 lb gorilla. As far as I can tell, this is probably about the best he could do in figuring out how to reassure all of us that the deal spoken of in the PR he had to take down was a real deal. And also, by this, we now have more detail than we had in the PR he had to take down.
So, heres the summary, as it looks to me:
Paul et al have long had innumerable "hinted at" deals just out beyond our sight. We have all agonized as deals came up and evaporated. Now we are told they are focused on one and only one deal: the deal with the one "large" client.
OK. Fine... mystery removed.
Now, here's the way I see our history, up to the present.
After the lawsuit forced them to dilute and recreate an entirely new product, Spooz hired people to try to land deals. They hired marketing people. They hired help desk types. They planned to sell to as many entities as they could dig up. And, during these days, they saw all kinds of opportunities sail across their gunsights. All kinds of "out there" opportunities, like the SFB deal, came and went. They chased them. None materialized.
I know most people have been employees for most of their lives, and I was too until I started my own consulting firm, but I want to elaboarte on how being a small business owner matters when looking at the many deals that came and went at Spooz.
I used to sell high end document management solutions to corporate America. I did it for about 15 years, all in all. During those years, I went through much the same things as we have seen with Spooz.
I had one deal that I worked on for 5 years. It never materialized. Once, I had the principals all lined up and ready to sign and my own partner let me down and the deal fell thru. It involved putting scanners & document databases into every construction site of an international contracting building firm. It would have been HUGE. The one chance I had came and went and I never got beyond the day I had it in my grasp and my partner failed me.
Another company, one of the largest banks in the world, bought a system from me and then spent months punting the bill from department to committee to division and so forth until I finally had to legally repossess the hardware & software at a considerable loss, and at the loss of the very nice ability to reference this client in my advertising.
In another, I spent almost 3 years and ended up empty-handed.
Its just the way it is out there when you are trying to land "the big deal". Its just the way it is, gang, like it or else.
Every time I hear this refrain that the difficulty in delivering on deals is evidence Paul et al are liars and scam artists and so forth, I relate to it as one who spent his life trying to navigate the waters of "doing the big deal" from the weak position of being in small business.
You and I and every one else who has invested (not flipped) in this company, has pulled up a folding chair on the same side of the table as the guys who own the majority of shares. We are all of a particular "habit of thought", which in 99% of our cases means we approach pretty much everythin habutually thinking like employees rather than owners. I believe reality is that doing deals in small business is terribly hard, and the failures we all sufferd multiple times in Spooz are not evidence of fraud and so forth; they are simply the reality small business faces in the real world of trying to pull off "the big deal".
Well, folks, we have now pulled off "the big deal".
A contract has been signed and Paul has pulled in the reigns, truncating every other deal and is doing very intelligent things to streamline this operation to maximize the chance they deliver on this "big deal". Thats what today's PR is about.
All of the deals that came and went were like the ones I did when I was running to and fro myself, trying to land "the big deal". Thats just the way it is, chasing every deal that has even a remote chance of coming to fruition. Its like when you play gin rummy: you have cards in your hand and cards you can pick up to try to build runs. So, Paul et al spent the last few years trying to develop a business of deals on which to build a future. They hired marketing people and rented space and chased deals of all shapes and sizes. And finally, they actually land "the big deal".
They nurse it along, trying desparately not to let it fall apart. Then.... It actualy cryatalizes and a contract to deliver is signed. Allelujia!! Now Bloomberg is horsing them around; the 800 lb gorilla telling them where to sit.
OK. So be it.
So, Paul sits where they say to, as evinced by his pulling down the PR. But look at what he just did with today's PR: he effectively tells us everything we need to know to understand what has happened and what is now going to be the focus. And let me just say: the more focused the better, because I want them to deliver the Bloomberg deal.
Today we see that Spooz has logically decided to stop chasing any other deals and to do only one deal. As a pragmatic matter, all extra weight is let go. Office space for marketing and trying to drum up other deals is not needed. Marketing people: let go; in-house support people: ditto. The fact is that focusing on one deal means all these things are not needed for the time being.
So, thats the way it looks to me. I could be wrong, because almost everthing I said above is deduced, to one degree or another, and because I do filter events through a filter system that is mentally sympathetic to what Spooz has been going through. I readily admit I'm favorable due to my experiences, but I firmly maintain that this lends weigth to the legitimacy of my viewpoint, thank you very much.
All in all, its a very rational set of decisions IMHO. Bloomberg says: "We will license your stuff". Spooz says: "We will deliver". And, to get it done, the offices are consolidated, programming and support are outsourced to the guy who was doing it inhous (John Unwin), and finally, the business details (pricing & timeframe and targeted users size) are PRed. It looks like a pretty darn streamlined & efficient plan to me.
And remember, folks.... the deal with Kai is not exclusive. If they succeed & deliver on this "big deal", there is no exclucivity right held by outside parties. So, I say: "John Unwin, the ball is in your court. Deliver. Thats all I need you to focus on."
And, Paul et al.... thank you for finally landing "The Big Deal" and for finally letting folks know the details you told us of in today's Pr.
Go Spooz!!
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