Mr RouthierDear Nick:
It`s me again, I imagine you have been waiting for one of my letters.
I waited to write it to see if the outcome of this latest deal would materialize as promised.
Once again I like to ask you if you consider yourself a good CEO, as you well know since late 2009 and mid 2010 we have been taking the SP south and south, a few small rebounds here and there but basically down.
I also ask because I follow of how high you think of yourself and your team,how high you speak of your accomplishments and so on, but accomplishments without showing value leaves a sour taste in investors because as long as you think that way there will be only little change,you will still collect your salary as will your immediate team and we will keep on wondering and shaking our heads as to when things will change..
I have been fair,I have praised you and I have criticized you, but it seems that the last two years plus it has been mostly criticizing and very little praising.
So before I get on to the present I like to cover a bit of the past.
It seems you lost the rein after the S2D switch deal with Samsung, the Vizio announcement, 3DGo plans, the deals with the first Studios, the deals with Hisense-TCL and the 2012 PP.
Things fell when everything pointed to a banner future, the pressure increased and you couldn`t handle it, you refused to step aside or at least get the right help.
You did come a long way, you did set up things and for that we were thankful, but your lack of execution was more than obvious, you over promised, under delivered time and time again and you started doing things that made little sense.
Things that deserved to be followed were dropped and things that were doubtful were given the chance.
All of a sudden the thing that we were, mainly Hi-Fi took a second place to something that was a good idea but a hard one to build (3DGo), 3DLive was also dropped to concentrate full tilt on content.
I once mentioned that I wondered as to the excuse of being ahead of the game because of lack of content, but the content that was there and growing (ESPN-SKY-Disney-Sony-TV broadcasting) and others used the excuse of not enough mediums to showcase their content and so the hype was quashed and everything had to be rebuilt.
We had the technology to showcase that content (that could have grown) but we could not convince anybody to buy it or to partner with us, to share “your dream” or in plain words we could not sell it.
So there we were in a catch 22 , you did but you couldn`t.
So without any real thoughts as to consequences when partnerships could have been explored to see how to get that right or at least try to put it on the right track “you” decided that we would also supply the content for our technology.
We would not only supply it we would take care of everything, it was a no brainer, we had the technology and we`ll supply the content, but to do that you needed “money” and assurances, we did not have either so what did you do?, another PP, the mother of PPs, a huge gift to those that would take a chance, we know most of them, I resented them for a while, but hey they took the chance.
A simple apology was all you needed for the barbaric unexpected dilution and voila there we were again.
You are a lucky man Nick, nobody questioned the trading orgy that followed, the SP carrousel ,the tens of millions of shares-dollars that traded hands unexplicable and non explanatory for months thereafter, a couple of good positions were taken and still no questions or explanations, not even the BOD appointed by the Caisse touched you..
To say 3DGo “so far” has been a flop it`s an understatement, we have the best and most extensive-expensive 3D library in the world but offered to the most thankless members of an exclusive VIP Club.
I did feel sorry for you for all the problems that we had, very poor planning and worst execution all around.
We changed BODs thinking that maybe they would set you straight or hopefully chart a safer more rewarding course but NADA, all that experience they brought with them has been so far wasted.
So here we are again, we hooked the Elusive One the biggest fish we could get, LG the King of 3D.
But all on his terms, we paid for everything again, we are good at that, and like I said before we had to subcontract most of it and I know about that, half my life I did precisely that and there are good and there are bad experiences, we seem to be on the bad side, always late and fixing glitches, it would have been so nice to have the Hi-Fi instead of building platforms and improvising, it would have offered the best picture and best of all dual revenues, but hey it`s nobody`s fault, it`s life, part of doing business you say, but we are still trying to salvage our tech it was said on the last two CCs.
Now we are anywhere between one day and almost seven weeks late for the launch, all depends of which promised date we use, not our fault, just those bloody subcontractors again with no apparent help from???>
Is it NeuLion, is it Deluxe, is it LG, is it us ?.
It does not matter, hopefully soon we`ll launch and mostly all will be forgotten.
But you still have not learned your lesson, a bad lesson from Vizio-Panasonic, there are no invitations to the party, no balloons yet and the worst part, after all the raving you gave to Social Media, mass emails and to LG the King of 3D there`s still nothing on LG`s web pages, nothing in the Stores and “nothing on the 3DGo site as to what and when.
Which models of LG will be compatible”, don`t tell me you forgot about that,TODAY IS NOVEMBER 17TH, we know you are busy but you are ignoring #1 Rule “again”, MARKETING, ADVERTISING, AWARENESS.
In spite of my letter “once again” I wish you and all your team from SIO including “us” the forgotten shareholders a Happy Launching filled with Happy Users that would rent an average of one movie per week per head, also wishing that the 50.000 new users you promised for year end will materialize sooner than later, but please make people aware of “what`s coming” so there will not be nasty surprises when they find out they have the wrong TV model.
Hoping and wishing also for more S2D switch and Autodetect deals everything and anything that can give us SP value.
I know you don`t take or listen for advice but I`m stubborn and keep trying:
Use Marketing and advertising from within, do it right, nobody seems to care as long as we take all the chances and pay for everything, those are our products out there, Vizio-Panasonic and so far LG have demonstrated that, promises not kept which results in minimal awareness.
Listen,share,delegate, be part of the team, don`t be the team.
We are running out of chances, we have been lucky that time has remained still, build the pot again whatever we have it`s not enough, it`s never enough.
If you like Social Media and mass emails USE them constantly, make everybody aware of what we have ,of what`s out there.
Be more generous with the free movie, give the one the user picks, have contests, make 3DGo Facebook (if you like it so much) a thing people will talk about.
Give interviews about it but on TV,radio, use the newspapers,magazines, tech websites with 3D articles.
Use our Chairman of the Board with his dozens of call centers even if we have to pay him ( I suggest credit).
Use anything, get this thing going once and for all and do it good if you want more Majors on board.
Good luck.