Slashdot Mirror
SCO's Finances, Legal Case Take Hits
geomon writes "This afternoon, SCO will host a conference call where they will present '04 third quarter financial data. The news isn't expected to be comforting to SCO investors as they are coming up a bit short; earnings and dividends will take a substantial hit. The only bright spot for the company is the settlement with BayStar, a deal that will leave most of the cash they received from the investment house in the hands of SCO management, if only for a short time." Reader ak_hepcat writes "Groklaw has posted the text for the latest IBM memorandum in its case against SCO. In a nutshell, IBM accuses SCO of not only wrangling the legal process to keep delaying the eventual resolution of this case, but they go so far as to pull the curtain away and show that this table never had any legs to begin with. I'm no marksman, but I can tell when something is full of holes."
In a nutshell, IBM accuses SCO of not only wrangling the legal process to keep delaying the eventual resolution of this case, but they go so far as to pull the curtain away and show that this table never had any legs to begin with.
Seems William Shatner should have been their spokesman, IIRC as a kid he cut the legs off his parents dining table and should have some experience here...
"It's more doomed than we thought, Scotty, beam us up NOW!"
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Reading SCO news is like watching someone fall out of a tree and hitting every branch on the way down.
It used to amuse me, now it annoys me. I'm just waiting for them to shrivel up and go away.
Seems like slashdot pundits have been predicting the imminent death of SCO and it's legal claims for the past year. They keep coming up with cute analogies (i.e. table without legs) but I'm wondering if Slashdot is not really giving us an objective viewpoint here.
that at the upcoming press conference SCO will announce that IBM does not exist.
This will dissipate any investors' fears pertaining to the validity of the lawsuit.
I'm just guessing here, but if I'm right his is very bad for SCO. It would mean that Novell keeps the UNIX copyrights, the IBM case is limited to the Monterey contract and the Red Hat case can proceed with a finding on record that SCO has been blowing smoke about its UNIX IP.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
I'm no marksman, but I can tell when something is full of holes.
Thats good, because SCO investors must have the hole spotting ability of a depressed star-gazing lemming...
here you go
ahh the beauty of the Internet
and the stock is currently trading at $3.80, 6mo performance is definatly a sell
Their lawyers can also be sanctioned for submitting arguments they knew had no chance at all* of winning. Rule 11, anyone?
*N.B.: Before you get worried about closing the courthouse doors to legitimate complaints, that rule is used even less than it probably should be, and only in cases where the lawyer submits a claim (s)he knows or should have known is either misleading, false, or ridiculously frivolous (fails the laugh test).
Stop learning! Only you can prevent esoterrorism.
As much as I side with IBM here, it does seem a bit ironic to see IBM complaining about a competitor "perpetuating fear, uncertainty and doubt."
I think that was actually Homer Simpson, but don't recall the episode or why, but the
should echo investor sentiments rather accurately."Me, I invest in beer at least I get something for my money."
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
... all that time ago when SCO started this:
1. Did they really think they had something?
2. Was it a hope for IBM et al to buy them out and save a failing Company?
3. Did M$ really engineer all this anyway?
Whatever, but the last point is can a court, on whatever decision is reached now, actually stem the tide against this sort of action by large $$$$/££££ in the bank Companies deliberately trying to destroy a free (and perhaps better system), against an otherwise 'couldn't care less to who uses my code' attitude open source movement in the courts?
IBM has money to oppose. What if they didn't and couldn't fight back for OSS? Who could fight the monopolies then?
The next fight is these silly patents. I think that will be BIG trouble for all free people, let allow coders.
Please do not rely on a litigant's motion papers to prove a point. These are documents made to persuade a judge and as such are nearly advertisements. Wishful thinking aside, until the judge GRANTS IBM's motion nothing is settled. I am sure SCO's motions look pretty too - - it is not as if both sides lack for decent lawyers. In most cases anyway a judge will let the jury decide. Summary judgements are rarely granted unless discovery has proven a FACTUAL point which does not need to litigated. Defendents always file these motions which are sometimes useful in limiting the scope of the lawsuit but rarely result in a complete win.
To the press SCO offered litter
While leaving the stockholders bitter
If Darl hasn't cooked
SCO's books
Their position must be in the shitter.
results
Maybe they posted it ahead of time knowing someone would post the results in the comments, like this: http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/040831/latu104_1.html.
Summary: Revenue is $11,025,000 which is way down from 3Q03 revenues of $20,055,000. The SCOsource revenues are $667,000 vs. $7,280,000 in 3Q03. But, the SCOsource revenue was only $11,000 in 2Q04.
Strangely enough, the stock is up 6 cents in after hours trading.
There was a small company named SCO,
Whose chief did kvetch and crow,
"My code they have stolen,"
"I've got proof in my colon!"
But such proof he never would show.
Alright, here are some brief summaries of conversations during the conference call. (I have too much free time but it's interesting to witness a train wreck).
Caller asks SCO what they can do to protect their shareholders from what may be bad legal advice.
Response is SCO obtained the best firm available for the best legal advice available.
Caller asks would you seek a second opinion from a new firm like you would seek a second opinion from a medical doctor?
Response is anyone with these questions likely has not read all material in front of the courts and they would be unable to generate a conclusion because the paperwork is confidential.
Caller asks what would it take to buy SCO with the poison pill?
The board would need to set a fair price.
Caller asks how many people are employed by SCO.
At the end of the quarter, SCO has 230 people.
Caller asks since beginning on this legal crusade, how much has been paid for legal representation?
Just over $15 million for all law firms for the prior 5 quarters.
SCO currently has $43M in cash. Plans on paying $31M in fees - not sure if this is some baystar thing or legal fee.
Can you summarize the responses from the court that have been positive?
March 6th, Judge said SCO has shown good faith in its discovery process. Ordered IBM to deliver executives emails.
April 19th, SCO received good information from IBM and has been working through that.
Despite judge orders, IBM has not completely fulfilled the order to deliver the information request on March 6th.
Novell case, motion filed to dismiss, motion was denied. A new motion to dismiss was issued and SCO looking forward to dealing with that.
Autozone case, case was stayed but you get 90 days of discovery. SCO is currently going through that process.
Character case that IBM is trying to do of SCO's legacy AT&T contracts is misguided.
Additional hearing will be held on September 14th and 15th.
Caller asks is SCO replacing cash payments to lawyers with sliding scale contingency payments?
Yes. In a certain sense, the long term obligation depends on judgment and settlement amounts.
That's something like being in a religious argument and having Moses show up to argue your point, isn't it?
I've no idea why you think license purhaces don't count, since it's a pretty standard money laundering technique. But we've also learned that Microsoft initiated the Baystar inventment and while they claimed that there was no financial involvement from Microsoft, a white paper on Baystar's own website lists Micosoft and Vulcan ventures as two of their major investors. It has also come out that two of the other "licensees" (SUN & EV1) were influenced by Microsoft in their descision to purchase licenses (CA, the other major licensee, was given the license as part of a settlement agreement).
That pretty much covers all of SCO's funding in this venture. If you run down the standard checklist:
- Microsoft has the means to fund SCO's FUD
- Microsoft has the motive to fund SCO's FUD
- Microsoft has the oportunity to fund SCO's FUD
- To the extent that there is any evidence at all about the source of SCO's funding, in each case the ultimate source appears to be Microsoft.
That's why people seem to state it as an accepted fact; while it may not be proven it would certainly be the smart way to bet.-- MarkusQ