Open letter to Google

Recently, the CEO of Monster indicated that Monster was looking at every opportunity to realize stock holder value. The quick translation is that they are exploring the possibility of being sold.

The current market cap for Monster is around 1B with the stock trading at 9.33.  We have seen up ticks in the job market without any significant impact on the stock price of Monster.

Monster, Execunet, Careerbuilder and Dice are the odd men out.  Each has its own problems and they all missed the boat. The reality is that Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter are the current market places for connection to your next job or recruiter for the next job.

 Job search is ideally suited for the social media platform.   A candidate needs to brand him/herself; the recruiter or hiring manager needs to be in the market to ‘buy’ that particular brand.  These social media platforms are ideal venues for the creation and definition of our brand.   If we are looking for a job, search for the recruiter or hiring manager who will relate to your brand.

All is not lost for investors in Monsters, however.  If Larry Paige of Google wants to become a serious competitor to Facebook with Google+ and at the same time take on Linkedin, Larry has the perfect opportunity through the acquisition of Monster, at a reasonable premium, which is nothing more than petty cash for Google.

What does Google get for their money?  They get millions of users who can extend their brand beyond their dry resume; they get an application that they can adopt into their existing framework; they also get a list of companies that can be invited to post jobs at no cost.  Revenue will come from advertising and other promotional activities.  

Google+ in one move can outflank both Facebook and Linkedin. 

Larry, just something to think about…

Time for Google to acquire Web MD

The time has come for Google to take a serious look at purchasing WebMD. I thought WebMD was a great buy a couple of years ago when the stock was in the low 20’s.

In the last 12 months the shares have reached a high close to 60. Over the last few months the stock has been languishing in the low 30’s and the sharks are circling the waters (Soros and Icahn). A Private Equity firm has acquired nearly 6M shares or 11% of the stock.

Fundamentally, it is very sound firm. Over the last 9 months it has generated nearly half a billion in revenues and close to 44M in profits (eps)

In the hands of the right company, WebMD can have a very bright future.

Google is the company that needs to acquire WebMD.  They are essentially in the same market – that is, providing information.

Both Google and Microsoft have struggled with their personal health care product.

The WebMD imprimatur/brand along with the nearly limitless resources from Google makes the concept of Electronic Health Record (EHR) – defined here as, a collection of Electronic Medical Records very reachable.

The centralized availability of health information along with medical information would place Google or someone like Microsoft as a critical player in the upcoming changes in the health care delivery process and continuum.

A premium on the current price of $31 and 58M shares leads to a purchasing price around 3B which is a reasonable entree into the health care IT field which is project to exceed 40B by 2014.

My vote is for Google to take over WebMD.

Time to leave

I just read that Hamid Karsai the president of Afghanistan stated in a interview for a local TV station that Afghanistan would back Pakistan if the US were to start a war with Pakistan.


It is clear, or at least I hope, that our government is not even close to considering such an action.


I do understand the need of Hamid to play up to his constituency but not at our expense specially if you understand that brave American gave their lives to get the bastard safely to Kabul. ("The only thing dying for" by Eric Blehm).


President Obama needs to take the same stance as he took with Iraq.  Negotiations with cretins such as Hamid are destined to yield unwanted results.


I repeat the refrain from Bruce Springsteen song - Last to die:

Who'll be the last to die for a mistake
The last to die for a mistake
Whose blood will spill, whose heart will break
Who'll be the last to die for a mistake

The time has come to re-build America.

A note to Meg Whitman

As a board member you do bear responsibility for the current debacle at HP. 

Over the last decade, the selection of CEO and board members at HP has left a lot to be desired. Each of the last 3 CEOs have besmirched the HP brand making fundamental business or ethical blunders. Don’t become another name on that list.

You do not have much time to turn the HP ship around.

As long as the stock price remains so depressed, HP will be a target of take over.  It wont  be by a friendly party. Rumors or speculation that Oracle may make a play will give rise to others. The others may be from overseas.

Here is an unsolicited tactical plan for you which will give you some breathing room to find the “HP way”.

1. It will be less costly for you in the long run to walk away from the Autonomy acquisition than to wring out ROI from this outlandish purchase. The cost of walking away is far less than the years and organizational energies required to integrate Autonomy. Aurasma may be a neat a product but a company that does not have a tablet or smart phone will find it difficult to extract revenues from it…
2. Write off the Palm purchase and embrace Android. Re-enter the tablet market using Andoid while pushing your development team to create some new functionality which will make people re-consider your tablet.
3. Re-state your commitment to the PC and hardware platform – so that the core of HP remains intact.
4. Cut cost and price on both laptops and printers to be a good source of income this Christmas season and be able to end the year on a positive note.
5. Aggressively focus the sales force to sell services to the major corporate organizations – specifically, address the healthcare vertical.

Remember Lou Gerstner’s admonition when he took over IBM. You do not need to spend time developing a strategy. You need to get your team and the organization to execute and deliver results.

If you can stabilize the stock price over the next few months, and re-focus the organization on the ‘HP way’, you will have gained the time to build a vision and long term strategy for HP while also building a ‘can do’ culture.

YAHOO - NOT

I was amazed to read that Microsoft is again considering purchasing Yahoo… They were rejected once before. Instead of considering themselves lucky in 2008 when MS offered Yahoo $33 a share. Today, Yahoo is selling at less than $16 a share.  A fifty percent loss in value is not a great selling point at stockholder’s meeting.

We do hear that they there two camps within Microsoft: One that supports the purchase; and a second who opposes it. I hope that both Mr. Ballmer and any prospective Private Equity firm pass on the Kool Aid and begin to look at more promising acquisitions.

There have been recent rumblings in the press suggesting that Mr. Ballmer needs to go. It would behoove Steve to take to heart lessons from a recent series of event at another storied Silicon Valley company (HP)…. Mr. Apotheker did not survive the mistake of buying Autonomy for 10B. In the process of committing that mistake the value of HP dropped 40%.

If Mr. Ballmer wants acquire something BIG, Mr. Ballmer should beat Oracle to the punch and purchase HP. It is clear that this purchase will be costly and will require a great deal of careful integration of HP into Microsoft.

There quite a number of synergies to be derived from such a merger. The service and software side of HP should be a relative easy integration. The hardware side may not be as difficult as one would think. From the PC side, they may be able to optimize the operating system in ways that they did not consider before.

Let Jack Ma and the Alibaba Group acquire the rest of Yahoo. The killing of AOL does not merit a HP like 40% plunge in the stock price.

If Mr. Ballmer can avoid making the Yahoo mistake and wants to acquire some valuable and more modest in size, let me point him to a more sensible acquisition - WebMD… It certainly allows them to extend their health care presence and enhances their existing products such as Vault.

Mr. Ballmer take a pass on the Kool Aid (Yahoo). 

Born in The USA - Barack's election anthem

With all due respect to the BOSS (Bruce Springsteen)

Born down in surfer man's town
The first kick I took was when I hit the ground
You end up like a dog that's been beat too much
'Til you spend half your first term passing affordable care such

[chorus:]
Born in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A.

I got in a little  jam
And so they put a pen in my hands
Sent me off to Washington
To go and kill Ryan budget plan

[chorus]

Come back home to the refinery
Hiring man says "Son if it was up to me"
I go down to see the V.A. man
He said "Son don't you understand"

[chorus]

I had a buddies  in the House
Fighting off the Republican scums
They're still there, Ensign is all gone
He had his aide’s  girl in Washington
I got a picture of him in her arms

Down in the shadow of the penitentiary
Out by the gas fires of the refinery
I'm ten years down the road
Nowhere to run, ain't got nowhere to go

I'm a long gone Daddy in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A.
I'm a cool rocking Daddy in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A.

The need for reasoned voices

At this critical moment in our country history, when we need leadership most– we seem to be lacking leadership at the federal, state and local levels. The voices we hear are from: ideologues, toadies for special interest groups of all persuasions, or the misinformed public shouting at the top of their voices.

It seems to be that some governors (NY, NJ, CA) have taken the bull by the horn and are staking their reputation and futures on bringing creative solutions to their problems and equally spreading the sacrifice. We, Americans, are not afraid to sacrifice for the greater good. Others like in WI are bent on taking us back to an age of darkness and inequality by ascribing our ills to unions -- Wake up governor; have you heard of Goldman Sachs? Wall Street melt down?  They are equally culpable for your deficit.

We cannot ascribe the word leadership to the Republican membership in the House of Representatives; or the White House – the managers of our fiscal health.

We just had a report of from a joint commission which detailed the need for cuts in the entitlement and defense areas to get our house in order. The questions which need to be asked from this President are:  When will you lead? When will you be true to your motto – ‘Yes we can’?

We need to cut the uncontrolled growth of our government and paradoxically, invest in our future… ‘Yes, we can’ has given way to ‘You go first’.

Expecting anything from the divided House of Representatives is wasting our time and hoping for Obama to become a leader may be a vain hope.

I know little of Chris Littleton of Ohio, but he does seem to have a reasoned demeanor about him and he is an influential, voice in the Tea Party... Mr. President how about inviting him for a frank dialog? Maybe, we begin the process of coalescing this country to speak with a focused voice on how to solve our problems and in the process, leave a legacy of hope to our grandchildren.