!AcornNow - A cynical view
Mike Clark
pay for a 2nd hand RiscPC and also having read the various press releases
from Acorn I am afraid I have formulated a rather cynical interpretation
of the thoughts I imagine those currently in charge at Acorn are having.
I wonder if any long term projects are seriously being considered and that
includes digital television and also thin client computing? I am left
wondering if what is really happening is a straightforward attempt to
convert shares in the company into capital or eqivalent for the
shareholders and s***w the employees and the users of Acorn equipment
full-stop.
Acorn is a major shareholder in ARM and ARM at the moment has a good
prospect for generating cash return. However the value of Acorn shares is
substantially lower than the valuation of thier share holding in ARM! So
perhaps those in charge at Acorn are now attempting to find a way to give
value back to the shareholders even if it means destroying the whole of
Acorn in the process! If I were an employee of Acorn in whatever Division
now, I would be giving serious thought as to whether it was time to get
out and seek alternative employment.
These thoughts are my own cynical interpretations of the situation as I
see it. However I have always stayed loyal to Acorn in the past becuase I
find RiscOS to be the most productive OS for my uses. This is despite
having ready access to most other OSs when I need to for specialist
applications. So if there is any prospect of rescuing RiscOS and
continuing support for my favourite applications I'll definitely be in
line to purchase a new computer. I don't even care what name it has, it
doesn't have to say Acorn anywhere as long as it's an Acorn in spirit!
Mike Clark
Acorn user since 1983
Alastair France
Well, at least the title said what it was - a cynical view.
Speaking as one of the sixty...
If there are no long term projects underway and this is just a closure
exercise then you make everyone redundant now, rather than keep a hundred
people on, having to pay a hundred salaries, additional service for
redundancy if they are going to go later etc. etc. Your argument is
interesting, but badly flawed in this area.
The company as is left has a significantly higher proportion of engineers
than previously - I can assure you that Stan would have no wish for them to
be sitting around not doing anything productive.
One of the particular problems is the area that you mention above - the
value of the Acorn shares being lower than the valuation of the
shareholding in ARM. That's not a nice position to be in - the pressure is
very much on the company to return the value to the shareholders (if, as
many do, the institutional investors tend to take a fairly short term view).
In order to survive, the management have to put forward to the investors a
plan that show the shareholders deriving value from the business that
remains. I believe that this is what Stan has had to do, and I guess that he
had a timescale in which he was told to do it. I would personally have
preferred things to have happened differently, but for better or worse we
live in a free-market economy where a publicly quoted company has to behave
according to a number of laws and regulations, and, realistically where most
of the shares of the company are held by institutional investors, by what
If he is a double headed blood-sucking monster he does a pretty good job
hiding it. When he took over, practically his first move was OUT of an
office into an open plan area. He's not had an easy time of it, but I've
always found him very approachable. My old friend Peter B is bound to have a
different view (and one that I sympathise with) as his departure rather
co-incided with Stan's elevation to the high office.
He has a difficult task ahead of him, and I wished him all the best at my
exit interview yesterday, and meant it. I've had twelve years at Acorn -
there have been ups and downs, but they have been twelve GOOD years, and
that was built upon another four years of working with the technology
before. I have many friends and former colleagues that are still at Acorn
whose future depends on Stan being able to steer the ship into a profitable
situation.
I very much wish both sides well. I've been spending a significant amount of
my time building up the network computer side of what Workstations has been
doing (and avoiding Phoebe - indeed cursing the amount of marketing
bandwidth that it was taking), because I believed, and still do, that there
is an opportunity for a good strong business breaking that product into new
markets. I might be keen to work in, for or with any Phoenix organisation -
there are a number of particular skills that I could bring to that party,
but I do have to look after #1 (to say nothing of 2,3 and 4) as well which
means finding gainful employment!
I'm sure I'll see you around, whatever.
Cheers
--
Alastair (Ali) France
afr...@stet-os.demon.co.uk
Stephen Burke
> shareholding in ARM. That's not a nice position to be in - the pressure is
> very much on the company to return the value to the shareholders (if, as
> many do, the institutional investors tend to take a fairly short term view).
Just as a comment on this, AIUI the main institutional investor is Schroders,
who own something like 25% of Acorn and have done for several years; I suspect
they picked up a lot of it in the OM rights issue, although I wasn't paying
attention at the time. That isn't really all that short-term, given that Acorn
haven't made a profit in five years. I have to say that I'm only surprised they
didn't move sooner.
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Stephen Burke
>> Just as a comment on this, AIUI the main institutional investor is
>> Schroders, who own something like 25% of Acorn and have done for
>
ISTR someone posting here that Olivetti ditched all or most of their remaining
share at 115p just before the price collapsed - methinks whoever bought
them must be feeling a bit peeved ...
Paul Clark
> How can I found out about the share holding in a company easily i.e.
> without writing to the registrar of that company? I had in mind a web
> search of companies house ;-)
Try:
http://www.hemscott.com/EQUITIES/company/cd00923.htm
All you could ever need...
P.
--
Paul Clark mailto:p...@sysmag.com $ whois pc52
Systems Magic Ltd. http://www.sysmag.com