Beginning of the campaign to remove Chandratillake...

This email went to Suranga Chandratillake this evening, CC'd to julia@blinkx.com and BCC'd to 11 financial journalists (which 11? Ah. that would be telling...)

Enough is enough. Time for SC to be removed and replaced with someone who has a clue, can deliver a clear strategy and roadmap for the company, make a personal investment by buying shares to demonstrate confidence, and get the share price motoring...

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Mr Chandratillake

As a long-standing shareholder in Blinkx I continue to be appalled at the destruction of shareholder value which I have seen since buying into the company 18 months ago; I continue to be appalled at the company’s utterly woeful PR and newsflow management, at the lack of major, transformative deals – and most of all I remain appalled at what I see as your complete failure as CEO to deliver shareholder value, or even to acknowledge the need to!

I’ve seen you shouting your mouth off in the press about profitability next year: but then you said to Martin Sorrell early last year that the company was ‘very close to break even’ and that never happened, did it Mr Chandratillake? If talking got the job done Blinkx would be wildly profitable already – but sadly it takes more than words. It takes the right skillset – one which in my view you are sadly lacking.

The total fiasco of the Miva ‘bid‘ finally persuaded me that you don’t actually have a clue what you’re doing, and that your inexperience and inability to guard your mouth is one of the reasons the markets have so little faith in Blinkx, as evidenced by the company’s share’s continual weakness. As I write it looks as though the share price is heading (back) to single figures – and this for the self-proclaimed “world’s largest and most advanced video search engine” in the middle of what you have quite rightly described as a “perfect storm of opportunity” – a perfect storm which in my opinion you seem utterly incapable of exploiting to shareholder benefit.

One other bone of contention, Mr Chandratillake: why have none of the Blinkx management team, so far as I am aware, bought a single share in the open market to demonstrate confidence in the company’s future (and their own future wealth)? You were happy to sell shares at the IPO two years ago for 45p, and yet management isn’t buying at less than a third of that now. Were they overpriced then? If they represent good value now why aren’t you buying? Or do you think perhaps they are still overpriced?

Enough is enough. You have had more than two years now to deliver your vision for Blinkx, and as a shareholder I see absolutely no sign of any master plan. What I do see is an endless stream of pissant little news releases about pissant little partnerships (Bobvila.com? Please!) none of which can make the company much money.

I have no intention of selling my shares at a large loss. I do have every intention of doing my very best to get you removed as CEO and replaced with someone who can focus obsessively on delivering shareholder value - and, if they can’t do that, then putting the company up for sale to the highest bidder. The company belongs to US, the shareholders – not you, the managers who have never even put their hands in their pocket to buy a single share.

You better deliver, big-time and soon. Otherwise I wouldn't like to be in your shoes at the AGM - the one day of the year when you have to face your critics: and at the moment they are many and very, VERY angry...

xxxxx xxxxxxx

http://blinkxshareholders.blogspot.com/