VALLEY FIRM LOOKS FOR A NET GAIN MATTHEWS STUDIO GROUP EXPLORING ITS OPTIONS.Byline: Marla Matzer Rose Staff Writer In another example of a ``bricks and mortar'' company looking to boost its fortunes and future by focusing on the Internet Internet Publicly accessible computer network connecting many smaller networks from around the world. It grew out of a U.S. Defense Department program called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), established in 1969 with connections between computers at the , Burbank-based production equipment supplier Matthews Matthews may refer to: In places:
Imperial Capital LLC (Logical Link Control) See "LANs" under data link protocol. LLC - Logical Link Control of Beverly Hills Beverly Hills, city (1990 pop. 31,971), Los Angeles co., S Calif., completely surrounded by the city of Los Angeles; inc. 1914. The largely residential city is home to many motion-picture and television personalities. will look at options for Matthews' core business and its consumer and business-to-business Web site, www.showbizmart.com, launched less than a year ago. So far the company is not divulging what avenues Imperial Capital will explore other than to say the objective is raising money, said Carlos DeMattos, Matthews' chairman and chief executive officer. ING Equity Partners made a $10 million investment in Matthews last June. DeMattos, who co-founded the company 30 years ago, did say that the company is now focusing on the Internet, where several competitors are already offering the type of one-stop production services shopping that Matthews does. Meanwhile, the company's stock has taken a beating in the past year. On Tuesday, it closed down 12.50 cents at $2.25, which is off more than 75 percent from the firm's 52-week high of $10.87. The company has suffered partly from runaway production  An editor has expressed concern that this article or section is .Please help improve the article by adding information and sources on neglected viewpoints, or by summarizing and to Canada that has plagued many of the industry's production workers and suppliers. Matthews has recently focused on supplying equipment for special events, like premieres and corporate parties, to help make up some of this lost feature-film business. DeMattos said one possibility under consideration was to spin off Matthews' Internet operations as a separate stock. Another possibility would be to keep the current structure intact, but use the extra cash infusion to grow the business. At Friday's closing price, Matthews was valued at about $22.50 million. ``The company is focusing its energies on the Internet play,'' said DeMattos, ``and divesting away from the capital-intensive Capital-intensive Used to describe industries that require large investments in capital assets to produce their goods, such as the automobile industry. These firms require large profit margins and/or low costs of borrowing to survive. side of the business.'' DeMattos emphasized that, unlike their newer, Internet-based competitors, Matthews has been in business for 30 years and has the ``necessary bricks and mortar'' to deliver the goods Verb 1. deliver the goods - attain success or reach a desired goal; "The enterprise succeeded"; "We succeeded in getting tickets to the show"; "she struggled to overcome her handicap and won" bring home the bacon, succeed, win, come through . In the past two years, Matthews has sold several capital-intensive business units in order to focus on lower overhead and faster-growing segments. |
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