478
CORRECTION - IMAGESTATE
May 13, 2002
Sheldon Marshall reports that his position at ImageState has changed to that of Deputy Chairman of
ImageState Plc. He never had "day-to-day operational responsibility" as my report on May 4th
indicated. (See Story 477 .)
It was my understanding from my interview with Marshall in mid-April, and reported on April 15th
(Story 471 ), that after George
Sinclair's contract as Managing Director of North America was not
renewed Marshall, himself, intended to temporarily take over Sinclair's duties until the company
could recruit a new Managing Director.
In fact, that was not the case. Chief Financial Officer, Chris Adamson has temporarily been assigned
the additional duties of Managing Director while the company looks for a new person to fill that
position. It is expected that search may take up to three months.
Marshall continues as Deputy Chairman and a director of the company. His primary role continues to be
business development and not day-to-day operations. He is looking toward continued expansion of
ImageState through more acquisitions and said, "we still have cash to invest."
On May 8th it was announced that an additional 600,000 pound loan was provided by Odyssey Venture
Partners Ltd. and Mike Luckwell. These are the two largest shareholders of the company and together
they hold approximately 58.1% of the shares.
"We are actively looking at a number of content development opportunities in the areas of RP and RF
still images and motion picture footage", Marshall continued.
An interesting development in connection with footage is that Marshall reports that a number of still
photographers are producing both still images and motion on the same shoots. In some cases this
footage is being produced with high end digital equipment rather than 16mm or 35mm film and
ImageState, unlike most of the other footage companies, is prepared to accept and market work that is
produced digitally, if it meets their quality standards.
Marshall likes to call the recent downsizing that has taken place a "right sizing." He acknowledges
that their previous expectations in terms of revenue growth for the companies they acquired were
unrealistic and that the costs of integration were greater than expected and says, "sometimes it is
necessary to take a step backwards in order to move forward."
While the repositioning of the company as a U.S. corporation has been difficult, Marshall is "excited
by the opportunities we have ahead of us. Now the company is in a good position to move forward
toward profitability," he concluded.
He also pointed out that in the difficult times the industry has faced in the past year, many of the
companies ImageState has acquired and brought together probably could not have survived on their own.