Conference 7.286::digital

    This is completely wrong and, in fact, almost unforgivable, as they
    should have known what they are talking about.

    You don't need to have a graduate degree in Mathematics to understand
    that the market value of a company is different from the amount it
    earns each quarter and the increase/decrease in the amount it earns
    from quarter to quarter.

    Digital _used_ to have an unbroken series of quarters where the sales
    and earnings were increasing each quarter.  This was broken by the
    fiasco in 83/84, and again recently.

    Digital has never had a "losing quarter".  However, compared to
    consecutive quarters, or, as most Wall Street analysts do, Qn to Qn of
    the previous year, Digital has not had consistently increasing
    earnings.
    
    I don't know of any company the size of Digital that has had unbroken
    years of increasing earnings.

Thanks for setting my mind at ease that I'm not nuts, Pat.

Now the question becomes, who should verify that they reported what I heard
and how do we get 'em to retract it?

-Jack

    "Against stupidity, the gods themselves strive in vain."

re: My own .2

    An anonymous call to WBZ news just confirmed that they did report the
    story as I recalled it in .0. They recognize the fact that their report
    was incorrect and feel that the story as written was due to a
    misinterpretation of the newswire story by the copy writer. They have
    not yet decided whether to retract it. I guess I'll call PR and suggest
    they get in touch with Channel 4.

    -Jack

    My understanding is that Digital has never had a losing quarter.
    This year we have had quarters in which profits were down compared
    to the same quarter of the previous year, although revenues were
    up, slightly.  If we ever have an actual losing quarter, this will
    be momentous and terrible news, although not unrecoverable. Ford,
    GM, Chrysler, and numerous computer companies have had losing quarters.
    
    If WBZ really said "fifth consecutive losing quarter" this is a
    serious, inexcusable error that casts Digital in a very negative
    position. I hope that corporate PR gets on it immediately and demands
    a correction. Did anyone else see this news show? I can't stand
    to watch WBZ with all their happy talk and bonehead reporting.

    I saw the report last night (I am out here for a benchmark at MRO2,
    stop by and say hi if you are in the neighborhood).  The impression
    that I feal that the item left on most people was that Digital has been
    losing money (i.e. expenses greater then sales) for the last year and a
    bit.  I would vote for having WBZ do a etraction.
    
    Larry 

    The same story was broadcast by radio station WSSH this morning.

There was an article in the Glob today which stated that Jack Shields had told
a group of Financial Analysts that the market was still soft here.
Analysts lowered anticipated earnings for Q1.

Just as a followup, I did call PR yesterday afternoon. The person I needed to
talk to wasn't there so I left a message for them to call me back, as well
as a message re: the subject matter I wished to discuss. I never got a call
back.

And BZ didn't retract the story last night either.

Oh well, if corporate PR doesn't care enough to do anything about it, why
should I give a shit? I only work here, right?

-Jack

I am a member of the Corporate Public Relations staff. Jack's call was 
one of many on this subject received by our office on Tuesday. A staff 
person called him back more than once and had to leave messages. 
Unfortunately, Jack interpreted this as evidence that our office was 
ignoring the Channel 4 error.

Channel 4's report was indeed a gross misrepresentation of Digital's
recent financial history. In the most recently completed quarter, 
our "profit" (net income) was over $313 million. For the full fiscal 
year 1989, Digital's net income was $1.07 billion. In terms of dollars,
this makes Digital among the most profitable companies in all of 
American industry. 

We too considered Channel 4's erroneous report to be worthy of an 
on-air retraction. The day after it was aired, Channel 4 admitted 
their mistake but refused our request for a retraction. 

Getting a correction on a TV news broadcast is not as easy as with 
the print media. Most newspapers and magazines think of themselves as
"statements of record" and take care to set the record straight when 
they have erred. It is rarely done in TV news. In this case, we felt 
it was justified, but Channel 4 did not. 

Unfortunately, local television news operations do not often have 
staff people with a good understanding of business or economics, let 
alone of a particular industry. You would think that someone in the
news department of a major Boston station would have a fundamental 
awareness of the general financial health of the state's largest 
employer, or at least understand the difference between an earnings 
decline and a loss. 

In this case, it appears that someone at Channel 4 didn't know the 
difference between an "earnings decline," which means lower profit 
than the comparable period of the previous year (and which was used 
to describe Digital's recent quarters in a wire-service story on 
Monday), and a "loss," which literally means a period of time 
(quarter or year) in which expenditures exceed revenues, and which 
Digital has never experienced since it first became profitable as a 
young company. 

Mark Fredrickson
Corporate Public Relations

Well, as the guy who started this string, I'd like to personally thank Mark
for his clarification of the matter regarding Public Relations' efforts
to rectify this error on the part of the media. I'd also like to state that
I hope I was not misunderstood in my mininterpretation of lack of response
from Corporate PR  - I did not mean to imply that they were acting
irresponsibly.

-Jack

    Mark,

    Any chance you getting that reply into the editorial pages of a couple of
    Boston newspapers? It's been very disappointing this week to read about
    "troubled Digital". Perception is very important and when news of the
    severance offer is plunked right next to the latest rumored layoffs at
    Wang something needs to be done. 

    Gail

    Well , the Wall Street Journal today carries a frontpage story on
    DEC with a broad description of the business picture, the technical
    strategy, and accompanying graaphs of earnings, revenues, and
    capital spending.
    
    Story continues on page A5 with analysis of organization changes
    and management restructuring.  Seems to be a fair assessment.
    

I have been getting an incredible number of telephone calls from
recruiting agencies this week.  They have been reading these bad
things about DEC and they assume that everyone is about to rabbit.

John

    
    re -.1
    
    Maybe someone likes you out there....-;

    re: .14
    
    Yep, the headhunters do their homework on occasion.  I've seen them
    kick into action whenever there are rumblings of discontent in the
    ranks.   got calls after the "Death of Plan A" and the wage freeze
    announcements, and I will probably get calls when the news about the
    severance plan gets down here (Texas).  
    
    While the employment possibilities at computer vendors are minimal
    since most manufacturers (like us) are scaling back, there is still
    a shortage of qualified computer professionals in MIS shops and other
    areas where computers are proliferating.  Just in case anyone hadn't
    noticed, we are still selling computers at a phenomenal rate;  we just
    don't make as much profit on each one as we used to ...
    
    So the headhunters are paying even more attention to the employees of
    computer vendors these days.  I'm not trying to endorse the idea of
    leaving DEC and going to work in the end-user environment;  there are
    significant differences in career paths, and few companies of any type
    (vendor or end-user) that can match the total "quality" of life at DEC.
    
    Geoff

  >  < Note 911.16 by AUSTIN::UNLAND "Sic Biscuitus Disintegratum" >
  >  
  >    Just in case anyone hadn't
  >  noticed, we are still selling computers at a phenomenal rate;  we just
  >  don't make as much profit on each one as we used to ...
                                                   
    And that, dear friends, in a nutshell, is all that's wrong with
    our balance sheet right now.                   
                                                   
    If EVERYONE in the corporation cut that out and pasted it on their
    office (cubicle, car, whatever), and held EVERYTHING they did up against
    it and said to themselves:                               
                                                             
       "Is what I am about to do/decide/spend going to help this situation
        or make it worse?"                                   
                                                             
    then we would turn this "recession" in Digital around in two seconds flat!
                                                             
    It sure beats bitchin' about management in a notesfile!  
                                                             
    Thanks Geoff.                                            
                                                             
    Mike