PowerLinx emerges from legal problems with three new in-home products.
By PAUL SWIDER
Published July 15, 2007
ST. PETERSBURG - When Mike Tomlinson took over at PowerLinx two years ago, he had a mess to clean up. Now that he has put the company's legal troubles behind him, he hopes to help consumers stay mess free while they create multimedia entertainment networks.
"Our reason for being is to make things simple," said Tomlinson, now the president and chief executive of PowerLinx.
Tomlinson inherited a company in turmoil.
The Securities and Exchange Commission charged the company, former CEOs George Bernardich and Richard McBride, and its former secretary and treasurer James Cox, with misleading the market in reports about the company's sales and finances between 2000-04.
Those three officers are now gone and the company came to a settlement last year with the SEC and improved its corporate governance.
Tomlinson consolidated operations but also pared back on activities to focus on a small set of products. He reverted to the core of electronics that use a building's existing electrical system as a network for information. The result will be on the market this year with devices for digital music, stereos and home theater systems.
"I needed to come up with three products this year that would sell," said Tomlinson, who has worked for Pepsi and Havatampa cigars. "My primary goal has always been what can we generate cash flow from most quickly."
TuneDog will be the first to hit stores. It is a device that plugs into a wall socket and connects to an iPod or other MP3 player to broadcast music through a home's wires. Users plug a receiver into any other socket, connect speakers and are instantly listening to their favorite music.
Two other "power line" products are configured for use with computers, stereos or home theater systems. The aim is to make music available anywhere in the house without having to run wires.
"Generally, people don't like to run wires," Tomlinson said. "That's why rear surround-sound speakers are rarely hooked up."
Retail outlets already sell items like wireless speakers, but there is demand for more user-friendly devices.
"Products that allow customers to enjoy music throughout the house are something our customers are interested in," said Brian Lucas, a spokesman for Best Buy. "Many people are investing in flat-panel TVs now, too, and the last thing they want is wires running out of it. They spend a lot of money, so they want it to look good even when it's off."
Tomlinson also has two video offerings. One, SecureView, is a refinement of an earlier product that was a camera screwed into a light socket. A receiver plugs into a wall elsewhere and connects to a monitor. New will be an Internet-compatible version people can use to monitor a camera from outside the building over a Web connection.
The company still sells RearView, a camera that lets truck drivers see behind them using the truck's electrical system, and SeaView, an underwater camera popular with fishermen.
Tomlinson is pitching the in-home devices to retailers like Best Buy and is still working out the final details. He said TuneDog and its variants would likely retail for $169. The security camera will sell for around $130 and the Internet version for about $279, which compare well with competitors out there, most of which are high end, he said.
The idea of moving entertainment around the house is a hot topic in the market, said Steve Koenig, senior manager for industry analysis with the Consumer Electronics Association.
"Being able to create a whole-house high-speed network has been the Holy Grail for some time now," Koenig said. PowerLinx's products "sound promising, if they've solved the problems."
Using electrical circuits for a network is difficult because appliances plugged in change the network when they're used. Wireless systems can have other difficulties, Koenig said.
Tomlinson said his company is hopeful that its new line of products can continue the PowerLinx turnaround.
The company has never made money, but has nearly cut its $5.8-million losses of 2005 in half since Tomlinson took over. This year the company might break even or show a profit if the new devices sell according to projections.
"We're not trying to compete with the $20,000 home entertainment network," he said. "We're going after the mainstream consumer market."
