Any thoughts on the future of HD?

[kRokksOn]

Originally Posted by O.G. Killa

I've said this before... I think eventually ProtoolsHD will get assimilated into Media Composer and ProtoolsLE will get assimilated into Pinnacle.

You mean like what fairlight is doing already?:)

Actually this would be very, very exciting.

[John_Toolbox]

Originally Posted by O.G. Killa

I'm sorry John, but nobody in a suit with a background in "money", (MBA, etc) not audio, is going to understand the downside to this. And by the time they do... it'll be to late.

That's the problem, it's not about money first, it's about delivering what your customers want first, which then leads to money. Look at Steve Jobs. There is a man who knows exactly what his customers want, and he delivers it to them. (IMO there are a few things they need to do to Logic, but that's a very small part of their business compared to ipods and ipads.)

Since it is so easy to make it look good on paper for the board of directors and shareholders, it would be very easy to get approval for such a long term plan.

Things like this are what happens when companies become so big that nobody in positions of authority have ever had to work in the industry they support.

Wait till they get so big they get bailout money!

Seriously though, I've seen it in smaller companies too. Several years ago I worked for a manufacturing company, the CEO who owned it, bought it. He knew his numbers, but didn't know what the difference between a phillips and a flathead screwdriver were. Pretty hard to run a business when you don't understand what your own employees do. More than that though, you need to understand your employees and how to motivate them. And again, what do your customers want and how are you going to deliver it to them... What scares me about avid is the level of animosity and lack of motivation reflected by past/present employees of avid on the glassdoor site really started to remind me of that place. I still strongly believe that any company's continued success starts at the top. Even if the owner hires a brilliant manager(or management team) to run the business for him, the owner's own interest and enthusiasm in the business must be able to filter down. If it's just about money and numbers to the owner, even the most enthusiastic manager will not be able to do their job properly.

Let's take a look at the Execs at Avid calling the shots these days... how many of them have experience in music production and/or audio production? Uh, none... What about video production for that matter!?!?! Sure, some of their talents they bring from other companies carry over. But how can they understand the needs of their clients without EVER having professional experience using the types of products they are about to make? The answer is, they can't. And because of that when looking at solutions to their financial troubles and long term growth of the company, they will only see MY list of pluses, and not John's list of very valid negatives.

But hey, Gary Greenfield grew up down the street from Elvis! That has to count for something, right?!?!?!?!

Perhaps if Elvis were still around he'd work for avid and vote for Gary on glassdoor.

[Electrox]

Pretty depressing, but explains a lot.
http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Avi...iews-E2291.htm

Avid Technology Principal Engineer: (Past Employee - 2010)
“Used to be great but it is dying now......”
Pros
The people I worked with were some of the brightest I've ever had the fortune to work with and the technology was fantastic.
Cons
The current executive cares only about the bottom line, that is painfully obvious. So many talented people have been let go or left because of the situation. I'm afraid, like others commenting here that it has passed the tipping point and Avid will die off.
Advice to Senior Management
I believe it's too late."

So maybe it is wise to keep an alternative...

[marcioguitar]

wow, what a mess! Now I am starting to understand what is happening, very sad, really depressing, AVID is going down the hill as far as future prospect and development, employees very upset and upper management seems like they don't care about anything except making AVID profitable for sale, which make sense if us as customer take a look for the past few weeks / months, there is no development, crashes, bugs and problems all over the place and no solution because most of the talented engineers are gone!

Originally Posted by Electrox

Pretty depressing, but explains a lot.
http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Avi...iews-E2291.htm

Avid Technology Principal Engineer: (Past Employee - 2010)
“Used to be great but it is dying now......”
Pros
The people I worked with were some of the brightest I've ever had the fortune to work with and the technology was fantastic.
Cons
The current executive cares only about the bottom line, that is painfully obvious. So many talented people have been let go or left because of the situation. I'm afraid, like others commenting here that it has passed the tipping point and Avid will die off.
Advice to Senior Management
I believe it's too late."

So maybe it is wise to keep an alternative...

[tonepad]

Originally Posted by O.G. Killa

You gotta love "glass door".

http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Avi...iews-E2291.htm

Wow 'powerlink"...thanks for this!

[allstaar]

Originally Posted by Electrox

Pretty depressing, but explains a lot.
http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Avi...iews-E2291.htm

Pretty damning. Quite shocked how bad this seems to be honest.

[O.G. Killa]

yeah. And from the friends I had working for Avid/Digi/M-Audio, they have pretty much been saying the same thing for the last year and a half.

Now... In all fairness, there might be other things going on in the background. For example, employees that you are planning on letting go, don't necessarily stay in the "loop" for future development plans just in case they decide to spill the beans after being let go. So all of these people (my friends included) could have been kept in the dark about the real future of Avid. And maybe at the beginning of this year Avid had a company meeting with all the employees still left and let them in on their new strategy.

But!!!!! Judging from the Bios/history of the executive team, they are the "cleaners", not the "builders" of companies.

Another really crappy thing to realize is that most likely everyone at the "C" level (CEO, CFO, etc) and possibly the Presidents and Vice Presidents, will get a percentage of the selling price of Avid if/when it sells. How's that for a motivating factor!!!!?!?! Hmmm... I could make $882,692 per year as CEO of AVID, or I could get 5~10% of several billion dollars (anywhere from $50mil to $200mil) in one check if I can find someone to buy the company...

Honestly...where's the motivation to keep it going? Who here would rather make $900K a year for the next 20 years, instead of making $200M in one day and never have to work again?

Then add to that equation the fact that you really know nothing about the industry your company is working in, you have no emotional connection to the products or the customers they serve. It'd be like one of us getting the CEO position of a fabric/textile business. Are we passionate about textiles? probably not. Do we really have the motivation to try and keep our textile company at #1 in the industry, or would we rather sell it off while the selling is good and move on? Maybe let someone else try to figure out a way to STAY competitive in an expanding marketplace after we've cashed our payouts and have long since retired.

The reason why Digidesign has always been successful is because the driving forces behind the division were musicians and audio post people that have "jumped the fence" into the corporate world.

The reason why AVID's video division has been bleeding out for a long time now is because it has not had anyone in a leadership position that really understands the focus of the products they make nor the people they sell them to.

The numbers don't lie. The exec's can dance and double-talk all they want. the fact remains that AVID's video products STILL showed a (4%) drop in net revenue for Q1 2010 while Digi/M-Audio showed an 11.8% increase in net revenue. but instead of investing those gains back into the audio products to make them better, they invested them into the video products so video editors can have RTAS now inside Media Composer and (IMNTLBHO) other stupid features like that. While we scream and scream for simple (and complex) fixes to blatant bugs in Protools and driver updates for M-Audio hardware so it can work with CURRENT computers.

[O.G. Killa]

Originally Posted by John_Toolbox

I still strongly believe that any company's continued success starts at the top. Even if the owner hires a brilliant manager(or management team) to run the business for him, the owner's own interest and enthusiasm in the business must be able to filter down.

I agree with every you said! Just pointing out though, that AVID does not have an owner anymore and hasn't in a long time. It has a "Board of Directors" and "shareholders" that technically make up the "ownership" of the company. And therein lies the problem. Look who is on the board for AVID and read their BIOs.

http://ir.avid.com/directors.cfm

It is depressing to see only two people even remotely tied into film and TV production on the board. Why isn't someone like Jimmy Iovine or James Cameron on the board? At least then the company and it's products would have a good chance of staying relevant and cutting edge!

Instead we have a business-to-business tools and IT management guy as Chairman of the board of directors for AVID... Because... uh... he really understand the future of the entertainment industry and can come up with a successful path for the future of AVIDs video and audio products, and AVID's standing within it's market? HAHAHAhhahahahahahahahhahahahaa!!!!!!!!!!

It's also interesting that the Chairman of the Board, The CEO, and the President of AVID are all the same guy, Gary Greenfield.

Let's look at what each role is supposed to entail...

Chairman of the Board - presiding officer of the corporate board of directors. The Chairman influences the board of directors, which in turn elects and removes the officers of a corporation and oversees the human, financial, environmental and technical operations of a corporation. The CEO may be combined with that of chairman to form the position of executive chairman. Recently, though, many companies have separated the roles of Chairman and CEO, resulting in a non-executive chairman, in order to improve corporate governance.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) - The CEO of a corporation is the highest ranking management officer of a corporation and has final decisions over human, financial, environmental, technical operations of the corporation. The CEO is also a visionary, often leaving day-to-day operations to the President, COO or division heads. Other corporate officers such as the COO, CFO, CIO, and division heads report to the CEO. The CEO is also often the Chairman of the Board, especially in closely held corporations and also often in public corporations. Recently, though, many public companies have separated the roles of Chairman and CEO (This is long-standing normal practice under the British System), resulting in a non-executive chairman, in order to improve corporate governance. President and CEO is a popular combination if there is a non-executive chairman.

President - legally recognized highest "titled" corporate officer outside of the CEO (who ranks highest). The President works directly for the Board of Directors and usually a member of the Board of Directors. The office of President can be limited by the Chairman/CEO to represent only one division within a corporation, such as the President of Sales. In the event there is no CEO, the President is the highest ranking officer but is not normally the Chairperson. There is much variation; often the CEO also holds the title of President, while a Chairman and CEO's deputy is often the President and COO. The President is often considered to be more focused upon daily operations compared to the CEO which is supposed to be the visionary.

So Gary is basically his own boss and boss of everyone else. He only answers to the shareholders. He is supposed to run the day-to-day operations of the company AND he is SUPPOSED to be the visionary of the company, seeing a viable path for its long-term success.

I'm sorry, but Bill Warner is a visionary. Evan Brooks and Peter Gotcher are visionaries. Steve Jobs is a visionary. Berry Gordy is a visionary. Larry Page and Sergey Brin are visionaries. Henry Ford was a visionary... Gary Greenfield is basically an asset manager and an internet database/commerce developer when all is said and done. I have no doubt he is amazing at what he does and I have nothing but respect for the man. He is a brilliant person and a great leader. You can't get in, let alone graduate from Annapolis, GWU AND Harvard without being both. But visionary? Visionary for the future of the entertainment industry's tools of creation? I just don't see it... I hope he proves me wrong.

[RMD]

At a recent AES regional conference we were all quite surprised at how many engineers, mixers, etc, were NOT using PT. Nuendo, Cubase, Logic and one PT user. They all had some form of LE version to transfer files to another DAW. Surprising. This has had to have hurt AVID's bottom line. In the current climate of cost effective choices, PT seems to have remained in a business model that is no longer valid; a closed system with dedicated hardware and a high price tag.

After using PT for over ten years i had to make the decision of upgrading my MIX rig for 5k plus (to 8 year old DSP ironically!) or moving over to a native rig for much less. The decision was purely based on dollars, reliability and sound quality. Unfortunately PT didn't win out that decision.

My personal thought is that PT will likely survive the film house market where the larger budgets can afford the PT business model. The rest of the music industry has moved to a more cost effective solution to creating music and the alternative solutions already exist. Even though PT has become somewhat of a standard it seems enough people are willing to go the extra mile to not have to work in that standard but use whatever they prefer.

best,

Robert DiVito
Toronto, Canada

[John_Toolbox]

Originally Posted by O.G. Killa

I agree with every you said! Just pointing out though, that AVID does not have an owner anymore and hasn't in a long time. It has a "Board of Directors" and "shareholders" that technically make up the "ownership" of the company. And therein lies the problem. Look who is on the board for AVID and read their BIOs.

http://ir.avid.com/directors.cfm

It is depressing to see only two people even remotely tied into film and TV production on the board. Why isn't someone like Jimmy Iovine or James Cameron on the board? At least then the company and it's products would have a good chance of staying relevant and cutting edge!

Instead we have a business-to-business tools and IT management guy as Chairman of the board of directors for AVID... Because... uh... he really understand the future of the entertainment industry and can come up with a successful path for the future of AVIDs video and audio products, and AVID's standing within it's market? HAHAHAhhahahahahahahahhahahahaa!!!!!!!!!!

It's also interesting that the Chairman of the Board, The CEO, and the President of AVID are all the same guy, Gary Greenfield.

Let's look at what each role is supposed to entail...

So Gary is basically his own boss and boss of everyone else. He only answers to the shareholders. He is supposed to run the day-to-day operations of the company AND he is SUPPOSED to be the visionary of the company, seeing a viable path for its long-term success.

I'm sorry, but Bill Warner is a visionary. Evan Brooks and Peter Gotcher are visionaries. Steve Jobs is a visionary. Berry Gordy is a visionary. Larry Page and Sergey Brin are visionaries. Henry Ford was a visionary... Gary Greenfield is basically an asset manager and an internet database/commerce developer when all is said and done. I have no doubt he is amazing at what he does and I have nothing but respect for the man. He is a brilliant person and a great leader. You can't get in, let alone graduate from Annapolis, GWU AND Harvard without being both. But visionary? Visionary for the future of the entertainment industry's tools of creation? I just don't see it... I hope he proves me wrong.

I have doubts about him as well. There's a post on the glassdoor site about his "Friends and family" hiring policy. In most situations, involving family in business can lead to more conflict, or avoidance of dealing with issues that would normally be addressed with someone who is not family. Occasionally there are good family relationships that are strengthened by running a business together, but it's usually the exception, not the rule. Most of the time it just adds stress to everyone's workday, and can seriously affect the success of the business. Friends who you became friends with by working together usually are safe, but friends outside of work can be great friends, but not necessarily great people to work with. It all depends on who you surround yourself with I guess.

Gary simultaneously being the CEO/chairman of the board/president isn't necessarily an issue to me, but I have more experience with creative productions than corporate machines. In any creative production there needs to be one person who ultimately has a vision and calls the shots. A democracy simply doesn't work, the project will most likely suffer from it if there are more than one person with equal power calling the shots. I also can wear many different hats(hence the nickname "Toolbox"), and I know that it is possible to juggle several responsibilities if you have to. But if I were in his position as a CEO I would want someone who wasn't afraid to criticize me, I think it helps keep you from losing focus.

I do hope that whatever happens, avid stays with us. It's very possible that Gary Greenfield's work may not directly affect us as end users, but if he really is trying to prep the company to be sold then something good might come from that. Apple buying Logic was a good thing in my opinion, perhaps a company like apple or apple itself buys avid, and really takes it to the next level.