Comments on Think Intrinsic's articles RSS Syndication from SeekingAlpha.com http://seekingalpha.com/author/think-intrinsic/articles http://seekingalpha.com/article/21674-the-long-and-short-of-idearc?source=feed#comment-78948 78948 Mon, 11 Dec 2006 21:14:13 -0500 http://seekingalpha.com/article/21674-the-long-and-short-of-idearc?source=feed#comment-78176 78176 Thu, 07 Dec 2006 17:38:22 -0500
Folks are also overlooking the following issues with the online business:

A. It is still a small part of revenue and income
B. It's growth rate is declining: 26.0%, 9.2% increases in revenue (YoY) in 2005, 2006 respectively. Twas growing at 80% per year in 2002.
C. Cost cutting has already been done in the on line search area, so there may not be saving to be had there.
D. There are major competitors to their on line search. Who do you think of when one says, "on line search" ?

The leverage is attractive, but this sure looks like the newspaper business to me.]]> http://seekingalpha.com/article/21674-the-long-and-short-of-idearc?source=feed#comment-77475 77475 Mon, 04 Dec 2006 13:17:07 -0500 The shift towards online search engines and map services is absolutely the most significant threat facing the industry. I guess I assumed that people were aware of this.

I feel that the industry is going to have to deal with online competition. I don't know how it will unfold, how dramatic the shift will occur, but it will be important. If IAR was in better financial shape I would feel much more confident in its ability to address this competition.

So the point here wasn't so much to say that the industry has issues, but instead to point out that IAR may be too risky because the debt severely hinders its ability to adapt to what we expect will be a changing industry. More concretely, they won't be in a good position to buy their competitors, and they may not be able to invest in SuperPages.com as much as they may like.




Jordan
Think Intrinsic]]> http://seekingalpha.com/article/21674-the-long-and-short-of-idearc?source=feed#comment-77460 77460 Mon, 04 Dec 2006 10:45:55 -0500