Random Thoughts

EMC needs to fire thousands of folks.  I think maybe 5,000 or more.  I realize this isn't a nice holiday thought, but it is true.  They have too many, which is natural due to all the acquisitions, but it has to happen.  They haven't had a big reduction in years and unfortunately the time is now.  They have too many folks at every level - so VP's need to go to.

The good news is big moves like this mean politics inevitably become part of the selection criteria - which in turn means some very talented folks will be on the street.  The better news is the industry is doing extremely well overall right now, so competitors will snag the real talent in a snap.  EMC has notoriously brutal non-compete agreements, but if they can you there won't be much they can do about it - unless people take extra compensation when leaving.  Be careful about that decision no matter where you work.  If you are good there is always a home for you.  If you aren't, then take the dough.

Why do they need to do this?  Several reasons.  First, they simply have too many folks with too high a cost for their business model.  Second, the stock hasn't appreciated at all even though the company has been putting up tremendous numbers - so the only way to appease the street is to attack from both a revenue growth perspective as well as a serious cost reduction one.  This isn't the only reason the stock hasn't appreciated, but it's one that is understood universally.  Third, and this is perhaps a bit out there, is that if I'm EMC, I'm seriously thinking about all the private equity money out there and taking the company private.  Shareholders would get a nice pop, and then EMC becomes private for a while, loses the microscope of the public entity and can really decide how to monetize all the stupendous assets it has acquired.  They might spin out some pieces which have had huge appreciation like VMware and Documentum.  There are lots of areas of technology they can exploit, and it would be easier without the microscope and not being able to be as long-term strategic as they could be, simply because they have to live by the quarter.

There is outrageous amounts of private equity sitting on the sidelines looking for very big deals to do.  This isn't as crazy as it may seem.  Shareholders could take a 20% premium on a flat stock and be happy, and two years from now EMC could re-emerge publicly, whole or in pieces, where the sum of the parts is a heck of a lot more valuable market wise than todays whole.

I am fairly smart.  I have reasonable math skills and spatial relations abilities, yet I can't wrap a Christmas present to save my life.  I spent well over an hour wrapping only 5 presents - and I really tried to do a nice job.  I wasn't drinking.  The results would have been better had a drunken, one-eyed pirate with a hook for a hand did it.  It was ridiculous.  2 of the presents required a second piece of paper, after careful measuring the first time.  I swear my dog was even mocking me.  I'm going to tell my wife that the little kids helped me, but I'm pretty confident that she knows they would have done a better job.

Does Harry and David shut down on Dec. 26th and re-open at Thanksgiving each year?  And why must they use big shiny cardboard boxes in their big fluffy baskets that are filled with small shiny bags of pretty crappy stuff?  Why not just use the shiny bags?  It's not even Christmas yet and I need to rent a dumpster.

I bought every present either on-line or on the phone (my wife's jeweler doesn't wait for me anymore, she calls after thanksgiving to tell me what I'm buying - I'm all about efficiency).  I was going to pop into the mall last weekend since I was driving my daughter and her two friends there (ever notice your daughters two friends are always nice and polite, and your daughter isn't? or is that just me?) I figured I'd go on in and buy a pan or something.  I am absolutely enticed by giant newspaper ads that say 70% off.  I'll buy anything at 70% off.  The good news is the mall was so mobbed I got irritated not finding a parking spot and dropped the girls off.  The bad news is while on-line I think I bought more stuff I don't need for myself than anyone else.  I did find a lovely blazer for $9.  Can't wait to see how it looks.

My wife is in superb physical condition.  She works out pretty much every day with a trainer who kills her.  She is stronger than anyone I know.  She walks or runs more than I drive - yet she'll spend an endless amount of time driving around a mall looking for a parking spot close to the door.  I don't ask.

I find it funny that power has become a hot selling point in things like switches and even blade servers.  My switch only uses 237 Watts and there's uses 324.  I appreciate we need to do all we can, but did anyone consider that the switch is connected to 12 giant disk arrays each sucking more power than the Hoover damn can generate in a day?  Unless you are still running VAX 11/780's I'm pretty sure the disk and tape you have on the floor is your real problem. 

Hate to say it, but I love Internet Explorer 7.0 and if you aren't running Spybot spyware killer you really should.  It's free and it's great, and enormously necessary if you have kids.  You'd think sites like Nickelodeon or Disney would frown on spyware hiding in their nice kid games but oh no, they are the worst.  AOL is awful also, I've had to banish AIM from my home, which really irritated my kids, but such is life.  Plus, once I can not understand any of the codes they use, I feel its time to squish the system.  My daughter had this as a line to a friend "Hmpooo r cclp" and the kid replied, equally as cryptically.  Had this been my three year old, I would have thought it cute, but knowing my daughter, I felt it was possible she were conspiring to steal my financial identity and buy her friends an Abercrombie store.

I couldn't be any happier for the folks at Isilon, who successfully launched their IPO and are sitting on a market cap of $1.45 Billion smackers.  Sometimes nice guys do finish first.

I'm digging all the football that is going on this weekend.  Two games on Christmas?  That's just awesome.  That is a well run sport, unlike Basketball, which I can no longer even watch.  I do enjoy the occasional full fledged mele of thugs who make more money in a one day than social security pays out - to play a game.  I'm all for getting what you can in life, but really, all that money to play a game and you start a brawl?  I'd spend all my time making sure I never got hurt, less I upset my gravy train and have to start a Rap career.  Baseball is a tad better, they don't seem to kill each other anywhere near as often, and those fights are much more entertaining to watch.  I love watching a beer bellied pitcher throw a glove at an oncoming steroid raging psycho as a defense, knowing the poor catcher will tackle the clown if necessary.  I also love a sport where 87 year old coaches can get into it, a la Zip Zimmer and Pedro a few years ago.  I haven't watched a hockey game since the strike.  How anyone can skate let alone stand on 1/8" metal blades while both throwing and receiving monster haymakers to the head is beyond me.  I never say anything bad about hockey players.  They don't make huge dough, and still do this.  That's just crazy.  Oh, and for my international friends, I didn't mean to omit the other football.  Most of the ESG folks went to watch the world cup at lunch every day this year.  I will admit I almost enjoyed it, but not really.  I do remember the head butt incident for some reason.  I think Americans would like it a whole lot more if instead of penalty kicks, each team put one guy in the circle and they beat the hell out of each other to determine a winner.  Just a thought. 

Have a nice holiday everyone.  Enjoy some time off.  Turn off the pagers, there will be plenty of stuff breaking next week to deal with.

Cheers