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David Richards

Sandisk To Buy Lexar?

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SanDisk which makes memory cards for electronics, is considering an option to buy Lexar Media industry insiders are saying.

SanDisk has hired Morgan Stanley to explore the bid, and a deal may include selling some of the combined company’s assets to Toshiba to avoid antitrust problems, a Morgan Stanley source has said. Lexar said March 8 that it had agreed to be bought by Micron Technology Inc. for $667 million, and the deal has been opposed by some Lexar shareholders, including Carl Icahn,said.

Representatives of SanDisk, Lexar and Toshiba didn’t return phone calls or declined to comment on the move. Shares of Lexar have rose 40 cents, or 4.6 percent, to $9.19 and traded as high as $9.33.

New Mobile Phone Services

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Mobile phone Companies are active this week launching new products among the big movers and shakers are Microsoft, Nokia and HP.

First it was Apple’s iPod. Now Microsoft’s taste in fruit has run to BlackBerries. The software giant will today announce several devices that link to mobile-phone services for messages on the go. Microsoft will build on upgrades announced in June to access new e-mail messages. The trick is to imitate Research In Motion’s push e-mail system.
Mobile phones running Microsoft’s software currently use a cumbersome and costly method to update e-mail inboxes. The first four devices with in-built push e-mail will come from phone and computer makers. The star is Hewlett-Packard’s new handheld iPaq hw6900. It’s been released as H-P moves to separate its handheld business from its notebook computers.

Other players include Vodafone and US carrier  Cingular Wireless. Canada-based RIM has more than 4.3 million subscribers, the vast majority business users. There are probably about six to 10 million mobile e-mail users, a few hundred thousand using Microsoft software. But with more than a billion mobile users in the world, Microsoft is betting there’s a much bigger e-mail market to open up.

Nokia, which yesterday announced a new handset (See story on next page) has signalled its intentions by buying RIM rival Intellisync for $430 million.

Microsoft hopes to compete on price. For corporations that already have Microsoft’s Exchange Server 2003 software for managing e-mail accounts and its Windows Mobile 5.0 software for phones, the push e-mail upgrade is available at no additional cost. Other corporates need to pay several thousand dollars to purchase a mobile e-mail server and may have to pay an additional licence fee of up to $100.

 


Australia gets new BlackBerry

It might be in dire strife in the US. But in Australia, Research In Motion is now offering the BlackBerry 7130e for Telstra’s 1xEV-DO mobile broadband network.

The 7130e delivers e-mail and data using the well-known BlackBerry platform, but in a mobile phone design. It can also become a modem for notebook computers. The BlackBerry 7130e claims a bigger and high-resolution LCD screen, Bluetooth support for wireless headsets or hands-free car kits, 64MB of flash memory, dedicated “send” and “end” phone keys, an intuitive user interface and enhanced battery life. A Qwerty keyboard fits within a traditional wireless phone form.

Nokia who last week did not want to know technology writers were this week back sucking up to them  to announce availability of the Nokia 9300 smartphone on Telstra’s mobile network using BlackBerry’s “push” e-mail technology. This connects to a corporate or private email service using the BlackBerry server, which is the same email platform deployed by a number of Australian companies.

SanDisk Set To Go Back To School

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SanDisk is evaluating the school market in Australia with a view to launching a smart new USB flash drive that replaces the need to lug school text books around.SanDisk is seeking to replace the shoulder crunching burden of school textbooks with a new USB flash drive with special content protection software for downloading and saving copyrighted material.

The Cruzer Freedom flash drive features SanDisk’s proprietary flash content processor (FlashCP) for securely downloading copy-protected material such as textbooks, novels and study aids. The drives can also store personalized, non-protected content.

The drive will be available in a single capacity (256MB)

The drive ships with a lanyard cap and a key ring cap for securing the drive to backpacks and key chains.

The first time a Cruzer Freedom drive is plugged into an Internet-connected PC, the device is initialized and can access the SanDisk Online Catalog of novels, textbooks and study aids.

In the US where the product has been launched the company is offering several free titles including Merriam-Webster’s Pocket Dictionary, a choice of one SparkNotesStudy Guide and classic literature. Students may also download a free 30-day trial of Microsoft Student Graphing Calculator software, specialized Web content such as HomeworkHub from Scholastic.com, and Web pages and learning modules created by educators. Content for sale includes textbooks and best-selling novels.

Dick Smith Boss Gets His Mosman Mansion While Suppliers Get Sweet FA

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Dick Smith CEO Nick Aboud lives in a multimillion dollar house in Mosman, he moved in shortly after the $500M dollar float of the mass retailer in 2013, today Dick Smith owes tens of millions to suppliers and manufacturers after being placed into administration overnight, consumer, also face losing tens of thousands in deposits or payments.

It’s was down at Republica, a Balmoral beachside caf? that Aboud who pocketed millions out of the float, and who drives between his Mosman abode and the Dick Smith head office in his late model Porsche met with Anchorage Capital directors to hatch out the $500M float of Dick Smith.

He then met regularly with senior Dick Smith management at his favourite caf? as Aboud desperately tried to prove to the market that he had what it takes to run a mass retailer.

Now after failing dismally Aboud is nowhere in sight.


Nick Aboud CEO of Dick Smith


A survey by ChannelNews earlier today has revealed that distributors who are owed millions are facing the real possibility that they cannot get unsold stock back despite the mass retailer failing to pay for the stock in the first place. 


Four distributors who supply audio and consumer electronics goods to Dick Smith have told CN that they are owed in excess $7.5M dollars.

“Dick Smith has not returned calls for days” one said.

One distributors claims that unless his insurance Company pays out a minimum of $0.65 cents in the dollar he faces the real possibility of going broke. 

What Aboud has delivered is a case study of how not to run a retail business.

He had a lot to prove after failing to get the top job at Myer.
 
When Dick Smith floated with a valuation of $520 million Aboud along with the directors at Anchorage Capital, several who live round the corner from Aboud walked away with millions in their pocket. 

It was only a few months ago that Aboud reported profits of $37.9 million, he bragged that sales were now $1.3 billion and net debt was a tad over $40M.
Despite this there not a lender in sight who wanted to support the mass retailer for the simple reason that the books smelt crook.

Were the sales real, were same store sales accurate and was Dick Smith really entering the appliance market because he saw growth or was it a big ego thing to take it up to JB Hi Fi who have started to get excellent traction in the appliance market.

Not only were the books smelling crook, the brand was not resignating with consumers. They trusted JB Hi Fi, The Good Guys and Harvey Norman but not Dick Smith even when Aboud started spruiking cheap deals prior to Xmas.

Jerry Harvey said the deals were “crook” and consumers believed. Him.

Then there were the dodgy house brand deals that delivered nothing but grief for the mass retailer who was desperate to generate cash flow at any cost.
Dick Smith was a dodgy private equity deal that has gone bad, now questions are being asked of the Australian Securities and Investment Commission as to how a private equity firm Anchorage Capital could get away with what has already been described as a “massive heist”

The Australian said earlier today ‘Only five months ago chief executive Nick Abboud was boasting that Dick Smith (DSH) was the fastest-growing consumer electronics retailer in the country, with the largest number of stores. That may, of course, be a significant part of the problem’
Anchorage appeared to have managed an extraordinarily quick turnaround, and an embarrassing one for Woolworths.

With hindsight, it stripped the group of cash by writing down its inventories brutally at the outset, turning them into cash and, with other write downs of assets that deflated depreciation charges, inflating future profitability.

With hindsight, it was the market’s focus on profitability rather than Dick Smith’s balance sheet and the way it had been reshaped that created the seeds of the group’s destruction. That was why the market was prepared to pay $520 million for the business.

It was the market, not Anchorage, which was at fault for not properly analysing and appreciating the implications of the way the business had been restructured ahead of the IPO. The sense of being ripped off, however, will make the market very distrustful of anything Anchorage might try to float in future said Stephen Bartholomeusz in the Australian. 

In today’s announcement of the appointment of McGrathNicol as voluntary administrators, the Dick Smith board said sales and cash generation in December were below management expectations.

They had explored alternative funding but formed the view that any success wouldn’t have been sufficiently timely to support short-term funding requirements and to allow the company to order required inventory during the next four to six weeks.

They intended to work with the administrators to explore all options to allow Dick Smith to continue as a going concern.

If the business is to survive and emerge from administration it is quite obviously going to need a big injection of capital, new ownership and management and a very different offer. 
It will also need new and different stock and a more disciplined and focused retail offer and strategy than it had been pursuing.

I doubt that there is a future for Dick Smith, in fact I doubt whether there ever was a future for Dick Smith. 

Australia only has 23 million populations and the market is adequately served by the likes of Harvey Norman, JB Hi Fi, Officeworks, The Good Guys and several small mass retailers such as Bing Lee.

Among these vendors alone competition is rife, especially as Big W, Aldi Costco and several other retailers sell the same stock that Dick Smith sold. 
Both manufacturers and distributors were spending significant amounts of money servicing Dick Smith who was well known for hitting vendors up for marketing dollars.

Millions went in but little came out.

What the industry needs to do now is consolidate behind the remaining retailers, as the fallout from Dick Smith could impact these retailers as millions of dollars’ worth of stock are washed through the channel by receivers acting for banks who are desperate to get their hands on at least some of the $138M they loaned to Dick Smith. 

Dick Smith proved too difficult for Woolworths to turn around and the apparent, but fleeting, success under Anchorage’s ownership was built on flawed foundations and, given that those foundations had been hollowed out before its IPO, misconceived ambitions in the relatively brief period post-listing implosion of Dick Smith will inevitably provide a case study of how not to run a retail business.

Town Cars Demand Credit Card Details Despite Poor Security + Flaky Web Site

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Executives who use car hire services such as Town Cars could be exposed after the Company recently demanded that users of their service provide credit card details prior to being picked up.

The move to change the information they hold on customers comes as taxi’s and hire car Companies battle with Uber for customers. 

I have used Town Cars for several years, then suddenly out the blue they demanded that I provide my credit card details “To be kept on file”. 

They claimed that this was being done for all customers who arrived back from overseas and wanted to be picked up at the airport. 

When I asked them what security measures were in place to secure these credit card details the operator said she did not know?

When I asked where the data was being kept or whether the data was being stored on an overseas cloud service the operator again said that they did not know where the data was being kept. 

When I refused to supply my credit card details she said that they would refuse to take the booking. 

They also cancelled a prior booking claiming that their new police was based on all credit card details being held in their system.

This is the same car hire service who has a booking web site that struggles to process information. 

Several times I have attempted to book online with this Companies web site only to have problems.

The last time I tried to use their web site to book a trip their online system kept telling me that my email address was “invalid” I had to book the service over the phone.  

The Company has no security systems running on their web site nor are there any assurances that this Company is not employing known criminals in their booking call centre.
 
To simple hand over a credit card to an unknown Company who has a basic HTML template web site is taking a massive risk especially as they employ transient drivers who have recently arrived in the Country.
On one occasion a Towns Car driver picked me up from Sydney airport only to start taking me the wrong way home. 

When I challenged him he said that he was following mapping on his mobile. 

It turned out that this was his first trip and was “new to Australia” he said that he had never picked up from Sydney airport before. 

What the Federal or State Governments need to do is immediately make transaction security a key element of their investigation into the NSW Taxi and car hire industry. 

Drivers and hire Companies have access to millions of transactions every month and as a customer there is no way of knowing whether skimmers are being used in cars or whether Companies like Town Cars have a secure database system in place, especially one that is secured by a third party Company who have in place the fire walls and encryption needed to prevent a hack attack.

Town Cars operate a high risk booking system simply because they have not invested in the right IT infrastructure or the management that are capable of scoping a secure environment for credit cards. 

EXCLUSIVE: Kleenmaid Director Tipped To Plead Guilty Trial Due Next Week

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The Kleenmaid fraud trial that that was due to start next week in the Queensland District Court is tipped to be adjourned with insiders telling ChannelNews that one of the accused in the $100M appliance Company collapsed has this week cut a deal and is set to plead guilty.

Three former directors of the Queensland based Kleenmaid

Group were set to stand trial on Monday, they were facing 20 criminal charges,

including a $13 million fraud against Westpac following the collapse of Kleenmaid.

At the time Kleenmaid operated 22 stores (including 15

franchise stores), and employed over 200 staff, more than 10,000 people were

left with debts as a result of the collapse.

6000 Kleenmaid customers lost over $28.5 million alone,

among them were hundreds who had purchased faulty products and when they went

to claim on their warranty found that the warranty claims were worthless.

Police charged the directors Bradley Young, Andrew Young and

Gary Armstrong with 18 charges of insolvent trading.

Brad left and Andrew Young right,facing several years in jail if found guilty.

ChannelNews understands that lawyers representing Armstrong

have made an offer to the Commonwealth Director Of Prosecutions, that is now

being assessed.

Shortly after the collapse of the Company the Australian

Securities and Investments Commission mounted a major investigation, they later

claimed that Andrew Young and Gary Armstrong, dishonestly withdrew more than $300,000

from the company’s bank accounts two days before it was placed in

administration.

Creditors of the company were angry about the collapse, and

in April 2009 a group confronted Andrew Young armed with a sledgehammer, in the

hours after it was placed in administration.

The mob at the time claimed that they had been robbed

of deposits that they had been placed on Kleenmaid products.

Kleenmaid was placed in administration in 2009, in 2012 the

directors were charged with 18 counts of insolvent trading the charges related

to debts of more than $4 million which occurred after the Company became funds deficient.

All of the directors were committed to stand trial in the

District Court on March 31, 2014 by the Maroochydore Magistrates Court,

Brothers Andrew and Bradley Young who members of the Mormon

Church told ChannelNews at the time of the collapse that they were confident

that they could rescue the business.

ChannelNews has since discovered that Brad Young via his

wife Shelly Young is now running a shoe business called Frau. The business has a

store in Chatswood Chase NSW selling what they claim is Italian shoes.

Back in 2010 Linda Young, the wife of Andrew Young,

registered as a director of four separate companies.

Company records show the four companies were registered to a

light commercial park at 127 Sugar Rd, Maroochydore.

According to ASIC records, Linda Young is the sole director

of Sunny Coast Holdings and Stockton Nominees, while Shelley Young the wife of

Bradley Young is the sole director of Randolf Holdings and Mortimer.

All four companies were registered on February 25 2010.

Each of the four businesses share the same shareholder,

Gayle Hanpson, who has a registered address on the NSW north coast.

The person involved in setting up these businesses for the

Young’s was Wayne John Wessels.

In April 2014 ASIC suspended the registration of Wayne John

Wessels, the former auditor Kleenmaid, following a successful application to

the disciplinary body, the Companies Auditors and Liquidators Disciplinary

Board (CALDB).

The suspension started on 29 November 2013 and is for three

years.

ASIC alleged, and the CALDB found, Mr Wessels failed to

carry out and perform adequately and properly his duties as lead auditor of

Kleenmaid’s financial report for the year ended 30 June 2008.

Specifically, the CALDB found, among other things, Mr

Wessels should have brought a higher degree of professional scepticism to his

consideration of Kleenmaid management’s assumption of the company’s going

concern and that there were deficiencies in the standard of his evidence and

documentation of audit work done.

The new business ventures come after Andrew and Linda Young

were forced to sell their luxury riverfront Maroochydore unit for $1.5 million some $275,000 less than what Linda Young paid for it in 2007.

Soon after the company’s collapse, the intellectual property

was bought by Sydney private equity firm Compass Capital Partners.

Both Bradley and Andrew Young face lengthy jail terms if

convicted of fraud and insolvent trading charges. Time in prison could stretch

to six years.

The Young’s have hired barrister John Rivett, who

represented jailed former Queensland MP Gordon Nuttall who was recently

released from prison.

Armstrong has separate legal representation.

Each of the criminal insolvent trading charges under section 588G(3) of the Corporations Act 2001 carries a maximum penalty of $200,000 or imprisonment for five years or both.

The two fraud charges under section 408C of the Queensland Criminal Code carry a maximum penalty of imprisonment for 12 years.

COMMENT: Pork Barreling Tony Windsor & His NBN Claims What An Utter Joke!

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COMMENT: Tony Windsor is an opportunist politician, who has suddenly stuck his hand up to announce that he wants his old seat of New England back from Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, a man he openly endorsed when he retired.

In an audacious press conference back in his old Canberra stamping ground last week, Winsor who appears to have become bored with retirement, and not being in the media limelight every day, has singled out the NBN as a key motivation for wanting to get back into politics.

During his years in the Federal parliament, Tony Windsor was the pork barrelling king, who had former Prime Ministers Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd, bowing to his demand for the simple reason that he and his fellow dancing partner independent Rob Oakeshott held the balance of power in the House Of Representatives.

One of the key demands made by Windsor was that his electorate be one of the first to get the National Broadband Network (NBN) rolled out in his electorate. 

This happened, now he claims that the Federal Coalition Government should spend billions of tax payer’s money rolling out fibre to the premises in places like Tamworth the largest City in his electorate.

“[The NBN is] a national issue of very high importance within the country areas, absolutely critical,” he said. “Go to Armidale and see what they’ve done there and what they are planning to do, and you will see that it is actually a cost benefit to be in the country rather than in the centralised feedlots of the cities.”

“It has to be fibre to the home, and I will fight to see that restored as well.”

Really Mr Windsor.

I suspect, you are an opportunist politician whose wife has got bore shitless listening to you rabbit on day after day as to what politicians should be doing in Canberra.
 
Remember you are the guy that 18 months was endorsing Barnaby Joyce now you want to take his legs out with cheap publicity stunts, the only reason that you are trying to take him out is the hope that your past glory days will return.

The chance of your past glory days returning are ZIP. 

You will be independent with no clout.

 No Coalition Government is going to give you the time of day let alone any pork barrelling requests for your electorate.

Your electorate has a better chance of getting a slice of Government funding with Joyce than what can deliver. 

You are all hot air and wild swings. 

Let’s take on board what you said last week.

In the New England electorate, Windsor said it was easy to assign blame for a shift from fibre to the premise (FttP) to fibre to the node (FttN) especially in the large rural City of Tamworth.

“A change of government occurred … Tamworth is not in the rollout, nothing has happened. Armidale, fully rolled out, fully engaged,” he said.

“All of the technology that will be required this century is happening in Armidale.”

Really ! 

NBN usage figures for your City of Armadale reveal that 80% of people are buying the cheapest and slowest of NBN packages available in your electorate. 

And despite this they can still watch a 4K movie streamed from Netflix, they can still do business every day without the fear of not being able to open an email or send a letter or read or send a spreadsheet.
 
They can even run security systems on their properties with images streamed live to a mobile device.

 They can even play the odd game when they have time or stream music to their wireless audio devices. 

People in your electorate including Tamworth can also get access to a Fixed Wireless capable of deliver 50mps which is ample for most users.
 
What I would like you to do is tell me what the bulk of your electorate cannot do with the NBN service they are already getting ahead of suburbs in Sydney that don’t have the NBN yet.
 
These are suburbs where millions of people live and big business operates.
  
I work in Sydney and if I can run a business that makes video’s and delivers 100 page digital magazines with built in video viewers and I don’t have the NBN one has to question the legitimacy of your claims. 

I am confident that that most people in New England with an NBN service can do the same as I do in the City.

You seem to have forgotten Mr Windsor, but then again you are a pork barrelling former politician, who has spent years living off the public purse, that Australia is an extremely small Country of only 25 million people. 

Infrastructure wise we are the same size as Countries that have over 200million people to help fund the public purse.   

In 2010, Windsor famously said “Do it once, do it right, do it with fibre” after he and fellow independent Rob Oakeshott backed the minority Labor Government.

Tony Abbott at the time refused to cut deals on climate change and the NBN so labor got the deal.
 
Now Tony Windsor is back peddling the NBN and climate change, and he is going out of his way to saddle both his electorate and the people of Australia with debt and bucket loads of it. 

He does not care that his grand children may one day have to pay for that debt with increased taxes.

Mr Windsor claims that he has long seen the NBN as essential nation-building infrastructure. 

With Windsor it’s a bit like saying “I want all Australians to drive a BMW so bugger the cost”.
 
What people are getting today with the NBN is like giving everyone a brand new Commodore and the option to upgrade at their expense to the BMW something that Mr Windsor does not want to communicate to his electrate. 

A user pay model where the really high speed capability of the NBN cost is funded by businesses that need the fast speed and gamers who want to sit with their dual curved screens shooting up each other across the Internet.
  
Mr Windsor, there are people in big Cities like Melbourne and Sydney who are taking hours to get to work or home because of lack of infrastructure, there are people sitting in hospital waiting rooms because of a lack funding.

This is what Government money be spent on, not super high speed fibre broadband for people in New England who want the cheapest of cheap when it comes to broadband connectivity. 

But then again most people know that politicians lie through their back teeth, move heaven and earth to preserve their free ride on the public purse and then when they step away from the gravy train suddenly realise that that the free travel, perks and all that time back in their electorate was not a bad deal after all.and suddenly they want to jump back on the train waving placards, “The End of the World Is Nigh” in the hope that people take notice of them.

Dick Smith Receiver Struggles To Flog Assets As So Called “Sale” Flops

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The National Australia Bank and HSBC who knocked back a $70M conditional offer for Dick Smith are struggling to sell remaining assets after Harvey Norman is believed to have walked away from buying the airport based Move Stores that were closed down late last week.

At a store level Dick Smith stores that the receivers Ferrier Hodgson claim to running a “massive” discount sale is still selling product significantly higher than JB Hi Fi.

A Bush digital radio is being sold at Dick Smith for $129 the same radio is on sale at JB Hi Fi for $128. You can also buy the same radio along with a Bush Kettle and Toaster in a breakfast kit for $129.


                        Dick Smith $129 Radio Vs JB Hi Fi Radio Below


ChannelNews understands that two major retailers have approached airport authorities in both Sydney and Melbourne with a view to taking on new leases for the Move stores. 

We have also been told that the receivers who is fast running out of cash to operate the Dick Smith stores will this week move to start closing down stores.

Sydney based Hi Fi specialist Len Wallis has made an offer to local Dick Smith staff to apply for vacant positions at his North Ryde based store.

At the weekend Fairfax Media reported that sources at Dick Smith approach Anchorage Capital, the Company that pocketed over $500M to help fund the struggling retailer. 

Nick Aboud the former CEO of Dick Smith who is currently being investigated regarding information and the lack of information supplied to shareholders was the executive who went to Anchorage Capital after the banks told Dick Smith executives that they were set to close down the Company. 
   
Anchorage is understood to be waiting for the administrator’s report and the outcome of the Senate inquiry before offering any commentary on the demise of the business. 
Close to 3000 people lost their jobs when receiver Ferrier Hodgson turned out the lights last week having failed to negotiate a sale.

The closure of chain’s four Move stores at Sydney International Airport on Friday, will add up to 48 staff to the unemployment queue within the next few months.

Losses before interest and tax blew out to $100.3 million at the chain in December on an $11 million sales slump, according to Dick Smith’s accounts exclusively obtained by ChannelNews, compared with a $2.6 million profit before interest in tax in September.

Fairfax Media reported that one market watcher said the banks’ decision to withdraw support for Dick Smith would be remembered as “one of the worst decisions in history because everyone has lost, including the banks”.

National Australia Bank and HSBC only took Dick Smith on in April, according to Dick Smith sources, and by December they had installed staff in the retailer’s head office to closely monitor its finances.

This week, Ferrier Hodgson put the retailers’ customer database up for sale, sparking concerns any transfer of customer information may breech privacy legislation.

However, a spokesman for the receivers said Ferrier Hodgson would “communicate with all customers on the database ahead of any sale” and customers would be given the opportunity to opt out of a sale.