Conference nyoss1::market_investing

	Interesting.

	A company called Ross Systems (NASDAQ:ROSS), out of CA, is a software 
company retooling itself.  It was very successful at writing and selling 
software to run on our mainframes and minis (aka: VAX).  As the VAX went down,
so did they.  Now, they're coming up to speed on client-server stuff.  The
C-S market is estimated at about $80M today and expected to BOOM to $6B by
1996.  Their stock was down to $3 and change for a share and is now about
$13 or so with a 52-week high of $15.  I'm looking at this one...

    Hi, In Datamation, dated 9/15, there is a brief article about Marcam on
    page 42. the article mentions that they are one of the fastest growing
    software companies with a 45.3% growth! I am puzzled myself why a
    company with such a growth is trading so low???

    The company is estimating lower earnings.  Is it time to
    cut loss?
    

    I saw the "bad" news this morning in the Globe. It closed last night at
    11 1/2 and at 12:45 today it was 8 3/4 - 9. ".3" reply to this note
    caught it earlier at 8; so maybe it will rebound a little. I've seen a
    lot of companies lately get beat up mercilessly because of
    "disappointing" not disasterous earnings report. Once the stale air
    clears, they seem to  creep back up some. 
    It is still a very good company, very busy, very pro-market. I could
    take a loss now, if I needed the $$, but I think I'm in this one for
    the longer term. In fact, I might even buy more at the present price.
    
    

    
    So how do you account for Alex. Brown saying earnings would be
    .38/share and what was reported in the Journal today, a loss of
    .20-.25/share?  Just goes to show you how much faith you can put
    in analysts' estimates!   

    Exactly,
    
         my friend has called Alex brown on several different occasions in
    the past month, and every time, the answer has been a definite hold on
    Marcam. In fact, they eluded that under 11 1/2 they would BUY. And then
    came the Boston Globe article....
    
         Analysts S...!
    
         I'm starting to think the best thing to do is watch a wave, get
    in, and get out a few points later and screw what the analysts say.

	Re. .1

	ROSS Systems

	I have been in and out of Ross and I think highly of the company's	
	management and the products. I'm currently out, but only to book
	my profits. Ross was smart enough to also port their software
	to HP's while Digital was going down, and was one of the first ISV's
	to port to the AXP's. Couple of years ago, it was voted the best 
	"growing" software company in the Bay Area, or some such award. 

	Be aware that there was a recent insider sale, when the stock dived
	from 12 to high 7's. It has since gone up to 13+. 

>    Marcam. In fact, they eluded that under 11 1/2 they would BUY. And then
    			   ^^^^^^
    That's "alluded".

>         I'm starting to think the best thing to do is watch a wave, get
>    in, and get out a few points later and screw what the analysts say.

    I agree completely.  If the analysts were right more than about 55% of
    the time, they'd get rich from their own trading profits.  Their real
    purpose in life is to give potential buyers that little extra shove
    necessary to "pull the trigger", buy a stock, thus generating commissions.
    IMHO, of course.
    
      John

         News Article: Marcam announces preliminary results for September
                                                               
 
          8-OCT-1993   Length: 63   lines           Businesswire

   NEWTON, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Marcam Corp. (NASDAQ:MCAM) 
announced today that, while the company generated substantially higher 
revenues in its September quarter compared to the same quarter a year 
ago, it estimates a loss for the 4th quarter at between $0.20 and     
$0.30 per share on revenues of between $32.0 and $34.0 million.  

	   Marcam's earnings in the September 1992 quarter were $0.30 per 
share on $29.0 million in revenue.  The company estimates earnings 
between $0.26 and $0.36 per share on revenues of between $125.0 and  
$127.0 million for the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, 1993.  

	   These are initial estimates of Marcam's results for the quarter.  
The company expects to issue final results in the last week of October.

	   Paul Margolis, Marcam's president and CEO explained that the lower 
earnings were due to revenues being below anticipated levels. "We are 
disappointed with these results for our September quarter.  Expenses 
were in control and below our internal budgets, but revenues were well  
below our expectations."

	   Margolis pointed out the difficult industry conditions Marcam 
faced during the past three months.  "During the quarter, customers 
and prospects continued to be attracted to our products because of 
their ability to create value through better customer service, 
shorter cycle times, increased efficiencies, and reduced costs.  
However, companies remain cautious about the industry-wide confusion 
over changing technology, and very cautious about the extremely poor 
macroeconomic conditions in Europe.  We are confident that our Open 
Enterprise Architecture strategy, our current offerings on both the 
AS/400 and open systems with our new XP technology.  our new 
object-oriented client/server technology, and our industry-leading 
investment in R&D provide our customers with the choice they need to 
be sure that Marcam is the right partner for their enterprise 
software needs today and in the future."  

	   Margolis also stated that the company will control expense growth 
in fiscal 1994 to maintain profitability.  "Our initial goals for 
fiscal 1994 called for very fast growth in revenues and expenses.  We 
now have a more cautious outlook and are, thus, controlling both 
planned revenue and expense growth to maintain our anticipated profits. 
We plan to continue to protect our strategic investments, monitor our 
situation closely, and adjust our plans as appropriate.  We are 
confident that when these conditions subside, Marcam's leading position 
in a growth industry and its strategic investments will provide great
returns for our customers, employees, and shareholders."

	   Marcam Corp. is a leading worldwide provider of applications 
software and services for industrial companies.  Marcam's PRISM and 
MAPICS product lines offer enterprise-wide business planning and 
logistics solutions for process and discrete manufacturing 
organizations.  Founded in 1980, Marcam has 35 offices throughout North 
America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia Pacific, and Latin 
America, and is represented in more than 60 countries.  Customers 
include such multinational companies as Coca-Cola USA, Emerson 
Electric, GAF, General Electric, Gerber Foods, Gillette, IBM, Kraft 
General Foods, Phillips Lighting, Ralston Purina, Rhone-Poulenc, 
SmithKline Beecham, Westinghouse, and York.

	   Marcam's products are installed at more than 15,000 sites worldwide 
and supports open systems and operates on the IBM AS6000, 
Hewlett-Packard's HP-9000, Digital's VAX and Alpha, and Intel-based 
PCs.

    
    Re. .7
    
    So what brought the stock up from 7 to 13+?  Did any bad news follow
    the report of insider selling?  Or did investors just forget about it?
    I read the article recently in the Globe about Ross Systems, it
    sounded interesting.  Though I think it takes a long time horizon to
    make money on the client-server computing theme.
    
    So are you just sitting out, waiting for a drop to do a short-term
    trade?  I take it you aren't in the stock for the long haul.

    Thanx for all the replies to Marcam. We'll be watching it closely over
    the next few weeks. Still uncertain to buy more or not. Mark

	Re. .10

	I would buy Ross if it fell under 10. 

    
    	Any updates on the outlook for Marcam ?
    
    	Ross told the street last week that they were not going to meet
    	expectations. I do not know what the stock did following the
    	news.
    

        >   Ross told the street last week that they were not going to meet
        >   expectations. I do not know what the stock did following the
        >   news.
    
    	$6ish/share or So after the "bad news" down from the low $8 range
    

    Is there any new info on Ross? It has recently declined to 5. Time to
    buy?
    				Jim

    
    In Tuesday's Wall St. Journal Ross Systems reported a loss of $7.0 mil,
    or 70 cents/share for the quarter ending December 31st.  Year ago was
    a profit of $1.5 mil (15 cents/share).  Revenue declined from $22.8
    mil to $17.2 mil.  Nothing like a 25% decline in revenue to hurt the
    stock a bit!  The loss included a $2.0 mil charge for restructuring.
    
    It appears Ross Systems' fate is still tied to Digital's.  They must
    be affected by the slowdown in VAX sales and the slow ramp up in Alpha
    sales.  New software to run on Hewlett Packard systems should help
    turn things around this year, if Ross stays in business long enough.
    
    I'll put in a note if I can find out anything from the company. 

	A strange coincidense that both ROSS and MARCAM are discussed in this
topic.  I just rec'd the 10K and annual rpts from MARCAM and they indicated
that ROSS and MARCAM are in court over some infringement stuff (I have the
details at home).

	ROSS is under $5 now;  last week close of 4 7/8 I think.

	MARCAM, on the other hand, grew revenues quite a bit and surged from
11.00 to 14+ and settled down at 13 1/4 this week.

	I looked at ROSS before and noted quite a bit of debt and heavily
institutionally owned; i decided to stay clear, but, at 4 and change....

    Looks like Ross fell below 4 recently, and is back around 4.375. After
    seeing some of their products at the OSF/RISC conference recently, I
    thought they looked like a good bet for a rebound; now I'm not so sure.

    
    With the leadership of the DECserver 2100, I would expect Ross to
    start doing better soon. I will be buying a few.
     

    .17 and other noters
    
    What do you think of Ross at 3 and change ?
    
    Also, where do you think Marcam is going ? I bought some at 9 and
    change and the stock is presently at 11 something. I have seen it go as
    high as 14 since I bought it. I had bought it for short term gains btw.
    Should I dump it now or do you think it will hit 14 something again ?