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Posts Tagged ‘Gerbsman Partners’

After slow start, U.S. deal making set to rise

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, tagged , , , , , , , , on September 3, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Here is a good analysis on the business outlook from Reuters.

“BOSTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – The next few months could see more mergers and acquisitions in the U.S. manufacturing sector as memories of recent market highs fade and some smaller companies find they need financial backing.

Executives at top manufacturers, including United Technologies Corp (UTX.N), had hoped the recession would provide ample opportunities to scoop up bargains this year, but were stymied when potential targets balked at selling when stock prices were testing 13-year lows.

But all of that may be changing, particularly if small manufacturers find themselves scrambling for cash when demand recovers and they need to restart production lines and bring back staff.

“As volume comes back for many suppliers, many companies, this may actually be the stress point for them relative to their financing needs,” Patrick Campbell, chief financial officer of 3M Co (MMM.N), told investors on Wednesday.

“This could actually be the point where we start to see some companies that maybe become a little more distressed … We’ve got our eyes wide open on that.”

Industrial conglomerate Danaher Corp (DHR.N) said on Wednesday it plans to buy two makers of scientific instruments for a total of $1.1 billion in cash, including a unit of Canada’s MDS Inc (MDS.TO) and Life Technologies Corp’s (LIFE.O) stake in a joint venture with MDS.

FIXATED ON THE PAST

So far this year, U.S. companies have announced $516.3 billion in deals, according to Thomson Reuters data. That is down 49.1 percent from the same period in 2008.

As potential buyers see it, the biggest roadblock to getting deals done this year has been that sellers are fixated on the past value of their shares. The Standard & Poor’s capital goods index .GSPIC is down about 34 percent over the past year.

“A lot of players are still hung up with their 52-week high,” United Tech Chief Executive Louis Chenevert told an investor meeting this week.”

Read the full article here.

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Three startups bring in VC funds for battery, fuel cell tech

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, Investments, Market research, Strategy, Technology, Venture Capital, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on September 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Here is some cleantech news from Cleantech.

“An Azusa, Calif.-based advanced battery company looks to close $27M, ClearEdge Power brings in $15M and stealthy Khosla-backed Seeo raises $8.6M.

CFX Battery expects to have $27 million in the bank in the next 60 days, but the company is still keeping specifics of what it is doing on the quiet side.

The Azusa, Calif.-based advanced battery company’s CEO Joe Fisher told the Cleantech Group today that his company has secured $5 million of its $27 million Series B round, without disclosing investors.

The announcement was among at least three cleantech companies that secured venture capital financing today, according to regulatory filings. CFX would be the largest if it brings in the $27 million, which Fisher is confident it should be able to do quickly. He said the company is also open to new investors.

The company plans to use the funds to continue to advance its research and development, for manufacturing equipment as it scales up to production, for working capital related to the equipment, and potential acquisitions in the battery space, Fisher said.

“We’re looking for niche-type smaller companies that have good intellectual property and potential to fit into our portfolio,” he said.

Other funding announcements today included fuel cell micro-combined heat and power (CHP) generation system developer ClearEdge Power raising $15 million in its fifth round of financing. And Berkeley, Calif.-based Seeo, a Khosla Ventures-backed company, raised more than $8.6 million in new venture capital financing (see Khosla-backed Coskata, EcoMotors come out of stealth and Stealthy Khosla-backed battery startup driving economic makeover?).

ClearEdge Power, which has locations in California and Oregon, manufactures what it said it are highly efficient CHP systems for residential and small commercial buildings, based on its expertise in fuel cells, fuel processing and systems integration.”

Read the full article here.

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1,000 Banks to Fail In Next Two Years: Bank CEO

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, tagged , , , , , , , on August 31, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Here is realitycheck from CNBC.

“The US banking system will lose some 1,000 institutions over the next two years, said John Kanas, whose private equity firm bought BankUnited of Florida in May.

“We’ve already lost 81 this year,” Kanas told CNBC. “The numbers are climbing every day. Many of these institutions nobody’s ever heard of. They’re smaller companies.”

Failed banks tend to be smaller and private, which exacerbates the problem for small business borrowers, said Kanas, who became CEO of BankUnited when his firm bought the bank and is the former chairman and CEO of North Fork bank.

“Government money has propped up the very large institutions as a result of the stimulus package,” he said. “There’s really very little lifeline available for the small institutions that are suffering.”

Read the full article here.

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The Spend-And-Borrow Economy

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, Economy, tagged , , , on August 28, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Ponzi schemes have a way of ending unhappily.

Here is a article from Forbes.

“In the last few months the world economy has been saved from a near-depression. That feat has been achieved by a range of extraordinary government stimulus measures: In the U.S. and in China, and to a lesser extent in Europe, Japan and other countries, governments have pumped liquidity, slashed policy rates, cut taxes, primed demand and ring-fenced and back-stopped the financial system. All of this has worked, but at a cost. Governments have been spending and borrowing like never before. The question now is: how do they stop?

This is not a simple problem. Restore normality too soon and the risk is that a weak recovery will double dip into a second and deeper recession. Restore it too late and inflation will already be ingrained.

Consider how much has been committed and how much has been spent. In the U.S. alone, when you add up the government’s liquidity support measures, its re-capitalizations of banks, its guarantees of bad assets, its extension of deposit insurance and guarantees of unsecured bank debt, at least $12 trillion has been committed, and a quarter of that has already been spent. Along with the rise in spending there has also been a very large fiscal stimulus, pushing the federal budget deficit to 13% of gross domestic product this year. (Next year, on current plans, the deficit will fall back but still amount to 10% of GDP.)

Not all the measures adopted appear on the budgetary bottom line. As well as monetary easing and fiscal stimulus, the U.S. and other governments have resorted to unconventional measures to ease monetary conditions. In the U.S., Japan and the U.K., real interest rates have been pushed down to zero, and governments have resorted to buying long-dated securities, the goal of which–only partially achieved–was to hold down long-term interest rates.”

Read the full article here.

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More IPO gossip, new prospects include: Greenplum, LinkedIn, Pacific Biosciences and Zynga

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, boic, Business models, Market research, Strategy, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 27, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Here is a recent article from CNN.

“If you have been an investor in technology IPOs in recent months you’ve done well.

Starting in April, and really gathering momentum this summer, there has been a slew of tech companies that leapt through the public market window including Changyou (CYOU), Rosetta Stone (RST), OpenTable (OPEN), and most recently Emdeon (EM).”

The article continues,

“Right now in Silicon Valley, investment bankers are busy making the rounds of promising portfolio companies trying to convince them of the wisdom of an IPO. There is always the question of what kind of company can – or should – go public. During the last wave of tech IPOs, after the dotcom bust, the rule of thumb was that firms with $100 million in revenue and profitability were IPO candidates.

Investment bankers on the prowl in Silicon Valley

Now, according to one prominent venture capitalist who asked to remain anonymous, investment bankers are telling him, “If a company can show revenue of $15 million per quarter, a good business model – and if not profitability, a path to profits – they can deliver an oversubscribed offering.” (One wonders wonder whether these simply are investment bankers who have had nothing to do for the last 12 months, trying to make their bonus figures.)

Venture capitalists have not had much to be happy about, either. It wasn’t just IPOs, but acquisitions that came to a screeching halt during the recession. Both of these groups desperately want the IPO window to stay open, and so far it is.”

And concludes,

“In Google’s day it was bulge-bracket investment banks – Morgan Stanley (MS), CSFB (CS), Goldman (GS), Lehman Bros or no one. The economics of the banks (characterized as going “down-market” to even do $500 million IPOs) required bigger deals. Today’s deals, with their much more modest size, are better tailored for the boutique banks – Thomas Weisel Partners, Jeffries, JMP Securities, Piper Jaffray, and the like. These are the banks pounding the streets in Silicon Valley the hardest.

Could it all end badly? Of course, and usually it does when the rush toward IPOs at some point sends half-baked companies into the public markets and they tank. But between now and then we are likely to see a group of very high quality tech companies look to go public – think Greenplum, LinkedIn, Pacific Biosciences and Zynga among many others.

For those investors with the stomach, it might not get much better.”

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