Strategy in TECH...
High performance loudspeaker manufacturer Bowers and Wilkins (B&W) sent a letter to their dealers last week addressing issues that have arisen recently, especially as they pertain to the management of the company. As is often the case with this company, the letter answered some questions…but raised others.
When news first appeared two months ago that Frank Sterns was making the move from Sony to Sound United, many folks asked…why? At Sony, he was a top executive with a global CE leader positioned at the top of the industry food chain…a backbone-of-the-industry brand…the inventor of many of the core technologies used in just about every home in America today. Yes, Sound United is a global player as well, but in a much more limited way…and focused exclusively in only one area…audio.
Maybe you’ve heard the buzz about a major shake-up taking place at B&W. Reports out of the U.K. say that Gideon Yu, Greg Lee, David Liu and others have all stepped down from the Board of Directors. There is a link being passed around to a web page for the “Companies House,” which is a government-connected registrar of companies and corporations. The link goes to a page which indicates that several B&W executives and directors have “resigned” their positions. So just what is going on?
I hardly know where to begin, there’s so much to unpack here from a 20-page quarterly report and a 210-page annual report. Emerald Expositions Events, Inc. [NYSE: EEX] has released their fiscal 2019 fourth quarter and full year results…and it’s hard to overstate the level of turmoil exhibited there. What kind of turmoil, you ask? Read on…
By now, most integrators have heard the siren call that they should launch a recurring monthly revenue program (RMR) to add profits and deepen their relationships with their clients. But to many of them, this is an idea that is easy to say…but hard to do. Quite literally, it can be hard to figure out just where to begin.
There are resources within the industry that can step up and help your integration company offer an RMR or service contract program to your clients. Some of them can even offer to take and handle your service calls on a 24×7 basis. However, those services can be fairly expensive. But one service I’ve learned about, MC Group, tells me that they have assisted hundreds of integrators with an affordable program they call “Turnkey RMR.”
Melrose Industries plc, the British turnaround specialist who acquires underperforming companies to improve their operations and management for resale, is now actively considering selling off the bulk of Nortek in a deal that could be worth $3 billion, according to reports from Bloomberg News and the Financial Times. If they actually execute this sale, it will be a relatively early exit from their ownership of Nortek which they purchased in 2016 for $2.8 billion.
Bose Corp. announced earlier today that it will close a total of 119 Bose retail stores as a response to changing retail purchasing trends. The locations to be closed represents their entire retail footprint in North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia.
For many, many years the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) – an exposition hosted by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) – was a huge part of the technology industry. In many ways, it was virtually the embodiment of tech – you HAD to go there to discover the latest products that were being shown to buyers so they could get their orders placed in time for the prime selling season starting in the fall of that year.
Universal Remote Control, Inc. (URC) has had a round of layoffs heading into the holidays. Taking place last week, the remote control giant has made cuts to its team that represent approximately 6% of their total workforce.
If you saw my recent article on the Emerald Expositions’ leadership turmoil (See: More Leadership Turmoil Hits Emerald Expositions), in addition to covering the fact that their new CEO (just started in June) was leaving the company at the end of the year, I also provided some sobering key figures from their recent fiscal third quarter results report. I have done a deeper dive into their report, only to uncover even more troubling information.
