Carlsbad, CA, July 18, 2005: The Geospatial Solutions Division of Tadpole Technology Group and OneGIS, Inc., have announced a formal business relationship to provide public utilities complete enterprise GIS data management solutions, based on the industry leading ArcGIS software from ESRI.

Under the terms of this agreement, OneGIS will resell, implement, and support Tadpole Technology's GO! Sync product line. By leveraging Tadpole's nearly 15 years of experience in the mobile GIS software market, OneGIS will be able to offer a complete enterprise solution for managing data in the field in addition to its current ArcGIS desktop application implementation and integration service offerings.

"The goal of OneGIS is to provide GIS solutions based on best of breed products," states Chris Cirillo, OneGIS President. "The award winning GO! Sync product line is an ideal offering for OneGIS because it fits with our 'one platform, one solution' approach. We look forward to offering Tadpole's mobile and enterprise GIS products to our customers."

"Tadpole Technology continues to expand its business partner program with a focus on premier technology partners and service providers," states Don Fryhover, Director of Business Development. "OneGIS has a focused commitment to bringing customer's world class products and services, and that makes them an ideal partner for us."

About OneGIS
OneGIS, Inc. is a full service consulting and outsourcing firm specializing in the development of turnkey GIS solutions for the electric, gas, water, wastewater, storm water, telecom and municipal government markets. Its goal is to provide off-the-shelf solutions that provide significant business benefits to organizations implementing Geographic Information Systems. OneGIS focuses its development, customization, and implementation efforts solely on ESRI-based applications, thus offering solutions on the best GIS platform available in the market place.

About Tadpole
The Geospatial Solutions Division of Tadpole Technology Group provides enterprise infrastructure software solutions to support the management, replication and distribution of geographic data within and between organizations. Tadpole Technology is an ESRI Authorized Business Partner.

For Further Information, contact:

Bud Porter
Marketing Communications for OneGIS, Inc.
Utility GeoSolutions
(770) 420-9404
bud@utilitygeo.com
or
info@onegis.net

Carrie Turner
Marketing Manager for Tadpole Technology Group
(760) 929 8345 x111
carrie.turner@us.tadpole.com

oh yes they are queueing up to buy the product, 75% discount to cost is worth a look, the shareholders will make up the difference-erm its supposed tobe the other way round lads the co. pay you for your shareholding,

ROTFLMFACB&HO!!!!!!!!!

Seq - what does the last bit mean "CB&HO". Seems far more interesting than the sp.

lol, lets see diplomatic language needed

C-appendage-male
B spherical objects-male
H-cranium (non-contravertial)
O-merely off

Blimey the ` eyes`has turned into a philosophical debating soc. now, thats how boring it is- they will get an alarm call soon when GEM bites.

I'm intrigued at the ongoing reference to the 75% discount to cost of the sales that are being made. If a significant proportion of the sale is purely for existing software, there is little additional cost involved in making the sale itself. If all of the costs of sale and implementation are less than the actual revenue generated then this is a profitable sale. You can either say that all initial sales are write-offs to recoup initial investment or you can say that there's a margin of loss that decreases with each further sale, but you can't have it both ways. That's unless, of course, you are claiming that the cost of making and installing the sale is actually greater than the revenue gained and I'd love to see the figures on which such a statement would be made.

If it's correct that people are queueing up to buy the product then that's great - this is actually the model that many software vendors aspire to. Not only are you recouping your initial R&D costs, you're also gaining market presence and establishing a pipeline for upgrades and support. What I don't know is if the contracts make provision for additional billing of time and materials or if it's a fixed price implmentation (as opposed to pure software sale).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating that anyone should buy the shares in the company, as there are a whole host of things that would put me off - I'd just rather be put off for the right reasons rather than some unqualified opinions stated as fact. Whatever the tax position of any member of the board, there's no way that they would sell now if they thought that there was any indication that the share price would rise in the short term. Basically that means that we can't expect any overly positive news from Tadpole in the next few months. I'm mildly concerned that the recently appointed financial director in the US is touted as being very good at raising money from the markets - it implies that they are not going to be cash generative any time soon (at least within the lifetime of GEM). The longer that they go without a real breakthrough in the client base, the harder it's going to get to become successful - the technology markets move very quickly for these types of product and it's very easy to be left out in the cold. The type of investor that Tadpole invests is also a downside, they are likely to be the more emotional, get-rich-quick types who cause instability in a relatively illiquid market. The market makers are having a field day with this and (quite understandably) taking anyone to the cleaners who wants to trade right now. It's quite a disincentive to buying a share when you know that you've got an instant 20%+ paper loss.

On the positive side though, Tadpole have a number of established products in growing markets, with sufficient diversity to carry any short-term issues in a given area. They are making sales, which is better than some within their peer group, and they've shown the ability to endure some pretty volatile market conditions. The balance sheet appears reasonable, although GEM would not be my method of choice of raising operating capital. I'm pretty confident that Tadpole will still be around in a few years time, I'm just not so sure what state they'll be in.

Personally though, I will take a position at these prices, accept that it's a gamble and monitor the situation. If you can't afford to lose the money then I'd suggest that a cash ISA would be a far more appropriate investment.

sounds like accountant speak to me, the last full year figures reveal a turnover of
4.831m and a loss of 3.057m,(total cost 7.881m.) now simple folk rather like to see a profit ,especially
after 20 yrs. loss, being one of them, that looks to me likethe following-(simplified for me.)
I make some `gribbly-grobs` for 7 88.1p, I then find a nice buyer who takes them off my hands for 4 8.31p, which now means I have lost 3 0.057p, which as a % means I am giving the buyer a discount to my costs of , oh lets not quibble 63% then not 75% , however the later figures for the half year showed an improvement,it has to be said
but the share &co. value will no doubt be diluted yet again, as the CEO has stated, more cash is needed

plus ca change

a disaster zone.

On the contrary, my perspective is a commercial technology one, I was Chief Technology Officer for a small/medium software house - that's why I maintain an interest in this type of share. Certainly never had enough fingers and toes to be an accountant.

Firstly, there's relatively little point in evaluating the company based on it's inability to generate a profit over the past few years. It's a different organisation with (some) different products and (some) different people. I take the point though that they ideally should have been successful years ago, but if they were, we wouldn't have the opportunity (may be the wrong word) to buy at this price at this time and have this discussion.

The model for a software vendor is a little different from the traditional manufacturing model that you reference above. Even in traditional manufacturing though, there is still the need for an initial investment in R&D and the creation of a manufacturing plant. This has to be recouped over a period of time through the profit realised by each sale.

In the software industry though, depending on the nature of the organisation, there are far more fixed than variable overheads. In this instance you actually occur an upfront cost of $1,000 to design your 'gribbly-grob' and then a fixed overhead of $1,000 a year to maintain, administer and sell your 'gribbly-grob' but there should be relatively little overhead for delivering the product once you sell it (maybe $25 to package, send and install). If you only get $50 for a 'gribbly-grob' you obviously show a loss of $2,025 for the first year if you only make one sale. If, however, you sell 100 'gribbly-grobs' in the first year, you make a profit of $500.

As unreaonable a comparison as it is to make, even Windows would have had to have made a certain number of sales before it became profitable and it only achieved profitability because of the sheer volume of sales that it made. Obviously none of the Tadpole products have the same market size but they should be priced to reflect the potential market and have a realistic break-even point.

I'd be satisfied with seeing the loss simply reduced in the short-term and I'd prefer to see costs either contained or reduced in addition to revenue rising. There seems to be the potential for a lot of duplication within the organisation and scope for cost-cutting - I'd read an increase in costs as a failure within the management structure and a possible indication of the 'buying' of sales. This is different from selling software at a perceived discount but actually involves the realisation of a greater charge for supporting the sale than the sale generates - I've seen this before and it pangs of desperation.

ah yes but to fund the next gribbly-grob ,I personally have to sell some furniture or even some of the wifes` GEM`s, and then she starts demanding that I sell another gribbly -grob to pay my taxes, again at the same 60+% loss, before I can
continue, this in turn makes me have to disclose to my customers that I may not be able to continue , the result is , ah yes despair will do.

That's a very interesting, articulate and well-informed position to take. I'll definitely treat it with the appropriate levels of respect when I come to make any further investment decisions.

Yes everything I have read from the Tadpole newsflow over the past few years pangs of desperation. They move from one goal to another and one excuse after another as to why they are failing to make any money. They also move from one management team to another and former 'higgh ranking officials' have be known to take shareholders for a ride (helicopter rides that is)

This will sink just like the titantic, only thing is it is taking 20 yrs to do so, mostly due to their ability to raise further capital from gullible 'get rich quick emotional type punters'

RIP KDC

why should management and shareholders be rewarded with a higher shareprice when the company fails to deliver any shareholder value what-so-ever?

Hi snap

Have to say I agree. Throughout this year, there have been a number of reasonably positive releases, OEM (with dollars), better than expected interims and a number of Cartesia releases which, albeit small, are adding cash to the bottom line. The AGM wasn't too bad as the word "profitability" was mentioned with a nod and a wink. However, the share price has dwindled into nothingness so, yes, shareholder value absolute zilch. What is new there.

It is a shame as all SW and the Board have managed to do, successfully, is cane the share price due to the negative sentiment it produced as the reason for his sales was not published. Look how the last two SW releases have not affected the share price as the reason for him selling has been made absolutely clear.

This one is a dog through and through. Which is why I'm out, or going to be, once the mm's kindly spike the sp just to suck in a few more in typical fashion. I'm hoping for 5.25-5.5.

Beau

lets hope robbo buys a shedful then-seems very well informed- not sure if he heard
of GEM , or the director selling-to pay his`taxes`, but hey don`t let that confuse.

lol

Gem and the director selling were two of the negative points that I raised about this company. A total contempt for shareholders seems to be a recurring theme amongst some of the small software companies that I've seen, it must be something about the type of people who sit in front of computers all day. I remember looking at another company where a couple of directors actually shorted their own company share's to the tune of several million pounds when the shares were at around 250p. With the benefit of hindsight it shouldn't have been much of a surprise when the shares hit 10p a year or so later. I'm not convinced that this is exactly the same but it's still not a good sign.

I know the industry but not the company, so I'm in no better position that anyone else to predict what will happen but I will sit on the sidelines and watch for any positive signs at all. I think that the fundamentals are good but I don't know if the people are capable of making the most of the situation. Right now the spread is ridiculous though and I don't see much point in getting in until things stabilise. Unfortunately the few quid that I have to invest isn't going to have the remotest impact on this share or any other.

rrobo - thanks for your thoughts. In the end, Seq, me and you all seem to agree that Tad remains a very risky gamble at present (not for "widows and orphans" as they say!). Still, it adds a bit of interest to my, otherwise, rather dull holdings.

I also work in the software industry and it is obvious to me that their is very little demand for Tadpole products. It may be good software, but nobody wants it......

hmmm, a major problem that snap, maybe thats why its fallen by 97% from its high, knew there must a reason to

AVOID!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It doesn't matter whether the software is "good" or not, what matters is whether there is a market and whether the company can effectively address it.

Software has a "perceived value" problem, mainly because it's an intangible.

I've been in the software business man and boy for forty years (!) but when I saw a demo of the Tadpole Endeavors stuff a couple of years ago, I was unable to see how they were going to sell it. They simply did not have a clue about how to market software, IMHO. I believe they spent a lot of time being driven by the technical team in Endeavors, a classic error.

Spinning off the hardware arm was also a mistake. It was only a matter of time before Tadpole could have been crafted into an irresistible acquisition for Sun Microsystems.

But then, what do I know.

Thanks MM, that's interesting to hear. Ultimately any news of what's happening on the ground with the company is more valuable than any other speculation. Allowing techies to drive the direction of any company can be a big mistake (it sometimes works, but rarely). If the development teams are just churning out code that they think is good but for which there isn't a proven market, then I do think that it's a case of throwing good money after bad.

What's your view on the latest sales that they've declared?