Sun taps ex-Merrill, ex-Fannie Mae exec for board

If you were an investment management firm with a big stake in Sun Microsystems, and if you had arranged with the IT vendor to get two independent board members added to the board of directors, where would you look for them? Fannie Mae? Merrill Lynch, perhaps? You might think not, but these are the organizations where Sun's …

[Walking Turtle]

In Search of Due Diligence

"You can't judge people simply by the organizations they work for. "

Work[ed] for, mebbe is more like?

Ah but the manifest results of that work... A rather different kettle of very schmellie fish, that. The prior El Reg article, "101 uses for a former merchant banker" and comments following still apply, I think. Newcomers, see URL

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/29/economic_models_and_upturns/

for a quick background briefing. Likewise the comments that follow. Greed-driven Perpetual Revolution Machine, thin-sliced crispy biffy tile jobs and all..

Um, I can't watch your backs, Sun Inc. You best do that in spades, I think. Those guys' former orgs if not them mugs themselves sure did have a firm 'n' authoritative participating hand in the high-hyped pie-flyin' Globalized Bancasino Ponzi-go-'Round and all its derivatives-derived wholesale robbing of America+World+dog blind in concert with certain ever-larcenous Bush famiglia et associata, now did they not just? Exited with nice fat golden parachutes carved out of your hide and mine, not entirely unlike lampshades only bigger, now did they not just?

Mebbe they'll do for tech-level decision-making(?), but I for one'd sure keep 'em both out of the Comptroller's office and far, far away from anything that even remotely resembles any manner of stock trading thereabouts, at all. Yessirree I would. Jus don' geev them no steenking tehrminals even especially with No Mouse, is best safety for all, I theenk, señors y señoras...

Um, has that fine Sun corporate HQ building got steam heat? It takes a strong man to manage live steam. Non-faulty intelligence is a necessity in that capacity, although the overwhelming tendency since the dawn of industry has been to place the laziest and most drunken ones on duty down there.

Mebbe they can work their way from the Boiler Room into the Mail Room, in time. If the blowdown schedule on them hypothetical boilers is faithfully and genuinely observed. But the self-destruct potential sure has been proved... Indeed, are they both really that honest and straight-up?

What makes those two so worthy anyway? Have we in America no fresh faces at the ready, the better to indoctrinate in the Enduring (eg non-bubble-ized) Way to Do Things? With non-Chicago School finance/econ/bizness degrees? Less like Friedman and more like Drucker already? The model those two apparently grew up 'n' graduated to perpetrate on us all is dead, Dead, DEAD.

Fact: Even the front-line Alumni Services receptionist at my own alma mater knows this, these days. We enjoyed a couple of wry chuckles together this morning on the phone when I re-established friendly contact, following the prior truthspeaking-driven thirty-three year Heretic's Exile from Econ 101.

Not making that up. Couldn't.

The Boffin. Because this long-walking one was indeed correct under Heaven in the first place, before frosh and prof alike. Due Diligence in all things, O Mighty Sun!

[amanfromMars]

Curiouser and Curiouser, said Alice.

Who are Southeastern Asset Management working for? Bankruptcies'r' Us? And are the Sun Board Bored Powerless Puppets/Manipulated Muppets?

A most uninspiring development.

[Matt Bryant]

Let's play connect the dots.

Since most board appointements have nothing to do with technology but more to do with Ye Olde Boys Network, you can look at this two ways. If Southern Asset Management are seriously looking to grow Sun's bizz, then they just hooked in a guy who has an idea of what tech is and should have links into the Government machine.and the financial industry, so should be able to hlep push Sun products into those areas. Of course, if they're just looking at someone to get in there and sort through the chaff from the wheat prior to putting the wheat up for sale then he's a pretty good candidate for that too.

[Colonel Zander]

Pay the Piper, Call the Tune

When you own 22% of Sun common stock - like SAM does, and you are the largest shareholder by far in the company, then you get to call some shots. Shame on Sun for letting the company value go to the point where it could be bought for less than the cash they have in the bank. Shame on Sun management and insiders for not holding onto the millions of shares of options they have been granted over the years.

[4irw4y]

Muppets Puppets Mirror Cards - Someone's Playing Through The Glass

amanfromMars 3 Feb 0911>

"Manipulated Muppets" --> Manipulating?

For dDefinitely IT's AIMirror which gives One a QUITe clear uberstanding that IT is rather AIGuiding Hand Putting HAIR in New Order in the reflection than really a Muppet in IT.... if one is sure to be not (-: A hi from the Zenator for Alice and the Bishop, Too..... let AILone the Mushroom (-;

73

[Ian Michael Gumby]

Now we know why Sun is in trouble...

Robert Finocchio sits on Sun's BoD.

Just a clarification, Finocchio aka Pinocchio was the CEO of Informix after Phil White cooked the books because Illustra was too hard to swallow. After Finocchio, you had Dexmier, an ex French Fighter pilot jock who couldn't run a company either. The only thing he did that was notable was in purchasing Ascential, which somehow Peter Gyness (PG) ?sp? took over as CEO. PG was the one who sold Informix to IBM for a billion (way too cheap) and then later Ascential was sold to IBM.

The biggest problem with both Finnochio and Dexmier is that they acted as if relational databases were a commodity. You can't be successful if you run a company where you think/act as if the product you make is a commodity.

Having him on the Sun BoD is indicative that they are not getting the direction that they need from a board and sound advice to turn things around.

Sun's only saving grace is that IBM is screwing their own selves out of a market leader position.

But hey! What do I know? Just tell Finnochio and Dexmier that Gumby says hi. ;-)