Stock down 20%

We wake up today to the latest carnage in the GoPro (GPRO) stock, down another 20% on weak earning`s, poor guidance, and a 7% cut in its workforce. There are several things the company could have executed on so that the stock would have held up much better than its near Calvary stampede from $94 a share to effectively $11 a share on a direct line down. For example, they could have followed the Apple model and come out with a much better device every nine months with new features that blow the previous model out of the water.

Poor Execution

They could have executed better on the strategy of building a brand around the media aspect of the company. They could have used their lofty stock price to buy other companies and diversify their revenue stream. As even they knew their stock was over valued at the time this is why everyone who could sell at the company was cashing in as soon as any lockout barriers were removed or circumvented in the case of the CEO with his charity fund. They could have branched out with new devices to diversify from being labeled the Camera on a stick company. But they didn`t, and it looks more and more that their heart wasn`t in it after getting their big payday in hitting the IPO jackpot.

Salesman are always closing

Nick Woodman talked a good game, this guy is straight out of the salesman`s cliché catalogue. He is good looking, young and charismatic and the tech industry was at its height of popularity, with markets at all-time highs and tech valuations garnering ridiculous valuations his spiel is even more believable. But come on when a company fails to execute as much as this company failed it is obvious that leadership was on the banquet circuit more than running a company.

How hard is it not to make some ‘marketing’ engineering changes to the main product and come out with a new model every nine months? But I am not going to be too hard on GoPro because they did come out with an initial product that people liked, and you cannot really blame them for maximizing their 15 minute`s Cash In Window. Not everyone wants to grind out a company for 15 years like Steve Jobs.