An Interview with Vince Sollitto, Chairman and CEO of Syntax-Brillian
September 27th, 2007 by 
James Cullen
I’ve been writing a lot about Syntax-Brillian (see all on BRLC) lately, from my opinions on the stock pre- and post-earnings to my attempts to contact the company and schedule an interview. Wednesday afternoon I was very fortunate to speak with Vince Sollitto, Syntax-Brillian’s Chairman and CEO, for about an hour over the phone.
Vince was great to interview and he was exceptionally helpful in giving all sorts of information about Syntax-Brillian, and I’d like to thank him for taking the time to talk with me. I’d also like to thank Hope Frank, Syntax-Brillian’s Chief Marketing Officer, as she was instrumental in putting this together.
I prepared the transcript of the call that follows, and at 8,000 words it is quite a read. I reviewed it for accuracy and I believe it to be a complete and accurate representation of our conversation. If there are any mistakes, they are mine.
The text is broken into three pages, see below.
Part I: Vince’s thoughts from the perspective of BRLC shorts, why the earnings report was delayed, and Jim Cramer.
Part II: Vince discusses the CFO situation, the Kolin relationship, and gross margins.
Part III: Vince on the inventory and tooling deposits, the Asian credit crunch, LCoS and Vivitar.
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September 28th, 2007 at 1:48 am
Best article on BRLC ever!! Thanks so much for bringing the truth to light! Great interview!
September 28th, 2007 at 6:54 am
Thank you for publishing this interview and many thanks to Mr. Sollitto for the information. As beeing a shareholder (bullish and long) it is good to get some information which helps to wash away stupid rumours and bashing blogs and/or messages on the BRLC stock board. Mr. Sollitto please continue to clear the picture of the current company condition and future plans. Great company with great products. Good luck! Btw. as long as the US-Dollar is weaker than the EURO, entering the european market could be an extra bonus.
September 28th, 2007 at 8:36 am
great interview James..thankyou for your effort and hard work….GOOD LUCK at BC,youre future looks bright……have fun fun in Boston,but the Yankees will take it all
September 28th, 2007 at 9:14 am
awesome to clearing fears and dbout.
September 28th, 2007 at 9:34 am
Excellent! Thanks for getting the interview and posting it. I don’t understand why these types of interviews don’t get published in mainstream media but the bashing, halve truths get all kinds of play. This information puts to rest many, many fears about the company. They still have to perform on their business plan and balance sheet though before investors will start buying agessively and bring the stock price up. Good work!
September 28th, 2007 at 10:12 am
Good job. I really enjoyed reading the transcripts. I also have to give kudos to Vince. He has really made an effort, after the debacle early this month, to get out the word about this company.
Let’s hope (for us longs) that they can address their need for more working capital and give us longs something to smile about as we head into 2008.
September 28th, 2007 at 10:40 am
Dear Mr Cullen:
Excellent interview. In reporting the facts and the truth you have done an excellent service to current and future shareholders. Excellent work young man.
Dino
September 28th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
Thank you for the interview. I appreciate the effort you made in putting this together. Unfortunately, Vince didn’t really address the biggest question. He blames the reduction in guidance for the September quarter on the Asian credit crunch.
However, as I’ve pointed out several times, with the amount of money BRLC sent to its suppliers in the June quarter (paid down accounts receivable by $60 million, made deposits of $130 million, plus another $165 million of normal payments for products, totaling $355 million that was sent to suppliers in the June quarter), their suppliers should have had more than adequate money to ship far more product in the September quarter than the current $180 million of guidance, REGARDLESS of the alleged credit crunch.
Further, the interview quoted Vince as saying the deposits with Kolin aren’t cash deposits, but accounting entries. This was the case prior to the June quarter. But the 10-K indicates that the $130 million of deposits to Kolin in the June quarter were, in fact, deposits of cash. This is clear in reading the cash flow statement.
September 28th, 2007 at 2:22 pm
Could you do an interview like this with CEO if IMMR..huge potential but poor coverage!
Kindly appreciated!
September 28th, 2007 at 9:13 pm
Mr. Market can be very cruel. Make me money and I’ll tell all my friends. Loose me money and I’ll tell all the world and especially my personal lawyer.
Seldom have I saw such hostility on a stock message board as I see on BRLC.
Thank you James for trying to get a true rational picture of all the accusations going on about this company. Thank you Vince for the time you invested for the interview.
My advice now is for people to step back and think what is the big picture of the future of Syntax-Brillian. After you think about that future then apply a stock price both for now and then in the future.
I have formed my own opinion. I’m long.
James has given a great tool. Use it, study it, share your concerns and lets get behind this company or get away from it, whatever you decide is best for you. Thanks to all who helped inform. Knowledge is king. Tom.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:37 am
James, thank you very much for your time and effort to provide this excellent transcript.
Also thank you Vince for coming out fighting for the share holders.
September 30th, 2007 at 5:19 pm
Many Thanks James for taking to trouble to gather the info. It answers two main questions i had.
John
October 1st, 2007 at 8:21 am
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October 1st, 2007 at 8:58 am
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October 5th, 2007 at 5:47 pm
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November 6th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
Loved the interview.
Rapid growth does bring challenges. Analysts/investors who are betting that the company will stumble are doing so in belief that 1) BRLC will not be able to continue executing well, and/or 2) at some point the incumbents like Sony and Panasonic and Vizio will make moves to squeeze out BRLC. This is similar to the environment Dell faced in its early years. The Syntax-Brillian advantage comes from its tight supply chain, just like Dell. This is an advantage that the incumbents will have tough time overcoming
History of continued growth will take care of the short interest in the stock.
I personally think that the fundamentals of the company is strong, and while it shows great growth, it is deeply undervalued at this price http://arohanvalue.blogspot.com/2007/10/syntax-brillian-is-this-best-value-in.html
-Arohan
December 9th, 2007 at 6:40 am
I sought out the transcript of this interview after reading a number of, what appeared to be, biased and misinformed attacks against the management of SB on the Yahoo message board. By the shear number and veracity of those posts, it became clear that a hedge or short fund was sponsoring them. After having important points behind the accounting and A.R. issues cleared up, I compared Mr. Silleto’s responses to the characterization of has responses made the two posters on the message board. Also with regard to issue of Cramer mis-speaking and not differentiating between a reduction in revenues and a reduction of earnings in the new royalty model in Asia, this also appeared to be purposefully misrepresented as a shortfall coming dollar for dollar right to the bottom line. From is exercise of cross referencing it becomes clear that distortions regarding Mr. Silletto’s response to some of the questions brought up during this interview have been disseminated to investors for the purpose manipulating this stock price down. I go back to the massage board and encourage would be investors, who have an interest in this company, to read the entire interview to avoid being mislead.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:04 pm
I was a big fan of this company and was considering purchasing their stock till I purchased 1 of their TV’s.
I purchased an Oleva 427 TV. I then got HD through Dish Network for the TV. i HOOKED IT UP THROUGH THE hdmi input. The picture was beautiful but after you change the staion a few times the sound becomes complety garbled. I relazie their can be lemons but its the way a company handles the problem that shows their comiitment to the consumer. I spent over an hour on hold trying to get tech support. They had no idea why it was doing this and said I would need to exchange the TV. They said I need to speak with customer service and after another 40 minutes on hold spoke with someone. They sent another TV and it did the exact same thing. Another hour on hold and spoke with their customer service rep who said we would get the head tech to speAK WITH ME. He said it was probably a problem with the HDCP. I told him I had 2 other HD tv’s and connected them to the same Dish box to make sure that wasent the problem and they worked perfectly. He said that they should try sending me a 227 because it was a newermodel and should solve the problem. Said we would transfer me back to customer service to set it up. Another 35 minutes on hold and I arranged it. Said the tv would go right out. 3 weeks later no tv. More sitting on hold for 40 minutes several times without being able to reach any oneand finally got the person I talked with who arranged the exchange. He put me on hold and found out that somehow they forgot to ship it. Promised me the 227 would go right out and gave me his direct number and email adrress so that I would not sit on hold. A week later the box comes and guess what…they SENT ANOTHER 427 rather than the newer 227. Emailed the contact at the comapny in addition to leaving a voice mail. AFTER 6 WEKS OF NO RESPONSE FROM HIM CALLED AND EMAILED AGAIN. ANOTHER WEEK HAS PASSED AND NO RESPONSE. So I am sitting here with a TV I cant use unless I want to turn it off after changing channels so that the HDCP resets.
I had a problem with a View Sonic TV and with in 2 day’s I had the new TV arrive and then a follow up call to make sure it was ok.
I have sterred 2 people away from purchsing Oliva TV’s because of my experience. I work at home in sales and cant even begin to guess how much income I lost because of all the time on hold.
DO NOT BUY THEIR TV’s…DO NOT BUY THEIR STOCK…theres to many companies making TV’s in this price point that stand behind their products.
February 12th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Check out IMMR there.
I enjoyed reading some of the content here.
Keep up the good work
All the best
Mark K.
March 20th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
a bad customer service experience has nothing to do with what you are talking about allen…heh.
July 9th, 2008 at 1:10 am
[...] -Vince Sollitto, then-CEO of Syntax-Brillian, September 26th, 2007 [...]
September 10th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
This company is beyond ridiculous, unacceptable and unethical to even a thug’s standards. I bought a TV from the great “AMAZON” via a third party seller “TIGER DIRECT” brand new Olevia 747i 47 inch…worked fine…..for about 40 DAYS! This TV costs for $1,700. It just turned off while I was watching it and after hours of hold time and being directed to do Olevia tech troubleshooting they stated the motherboard was fried. I couldn’t get the fabulous AMAZON to refund me - they sent me to Tiger Direct….who sent me back to Amazon…who sent me back to Tiger Direct who sent me to the manufacturer…SYNTAX BRILLIAN…oh. it is then the nightmare only begins….First customer service representative (all outsource to other countries) told me they would send me a new TV within a week. I call back when no tracking number arrived and was then told I would have to ship the TV back and wait another week. I laughed- 165 lb TV NO WAY- I’m NOT paying to send that back. Approximately 5 hours of my time later accumulated with the Syntax idiots I am then told that instead of sending me a TV they are sending me a motherboard and an outsourced “TECH” will put it in. I get the motherboard a week goes by I call the company who is supposed to put it in and they say Syntax hasn’t paid us..not putting in the motherboard until they pay us. I call back Synatax and they say “oh, we have a problem with that company (ya the problem is you don’t pay them) we will send you a NEW TV.” I say NEW not REFURBISHED they say no NEW. About a week later and another 5 hours now totaling at least 25-30 hours of my time and frustration another TV arrives. Yay I thought the nightmare has and end…and it does….JUST NOT THIS ONE! The next day I finally have time to sit down and watch the TV and it has a cluster of dead/stuck pixels in the screen-meaning a glowing red dot the size of a bit smaller than a dime in the screen ALWAYS ON EVERY CHANNEL. INFURIATED I call them back and after about another 10 hours with the lovely customer service )(^&$^(**&()(*#$R(*&#*&($#(&@$(&(*#$ idiots at Syntax they want pictures 5-6 in an email send me to a website where they want me to try to run some software on the TV ( I HAVE NO LAP TOP) that is supposed to massage the pixels. I said HELLO I’m not a TV technician, nor a damn pixel massage therapist send a new TV. After reaching the supposed all mighty “MANAGER” he proceeds to tell me that glowing red dead pixels the size of dime aren’t covered under warranty and that it is completely acceptable and they are not going to send me another TV. Bottom line: I paid well over a thousand dollars for a brand new TV and still don’t have one- I have had 2 defective ones and they will do nothing and take no responsibility for it whatsoever. I feel raped, robbed and pillaged in a very blatant way. ALL I can say is this is consumer abuse of the gravest kind -this company makes beyond POOR QUALITY PRODUCTS and has even worse customer service that borders upon treachery. I personally think anyone who is affiliated with this company should be ashamed to admit it. DON’T BUY OLEVIA OR ANYTHING MADE FROM SYTAX BRILLIAN!!!!!!THEY ARE WHITE COLLAR CROOKS LINING THEIR POCKETS ON THE DOLLARS OF THE WORKING CLASS…. Trusting this company was the worst mistake I have ever made and a prime example of the degradation of quality and customer service within the realm of electronics .
September 8th, 2009 at 12:59 am
[...] 2. Interview with Syntax-Brillian’s Vince Sollitto [...]