Update 2 – The employee from Qualcomm gave me a call and reached out about this incident. Suffice it to say he’s part of a larger organization and is maybe a little encumbered by organizational stuff. Full props to him for reaching out to me – well done. We discussed the reasons for the generic nature of the email and the failings of the exchange. A bad situation deftly recovered.

Update – today’s missive;

Please see dial in info.  If there is not a toll-free number for your country, we apologise but we do not have it as part of our service.  Please dial the following instead +1-858-845-5000.Warning – this is going to sound like  a rant. Be prepared.

Qualcomm can’t even wrangle in-country dial ins for this call… sheesh.

I get a bunch of PR pitches, and always try and engage with the PR person sending them, even if it’s kind of outside of my regular beat. Sometimes however, the pitches, and the communication around them, are so bad that I have no option but to go public with them. Case in point – on 24 July I received this from one of Qualcomm’s senior marketing managers;

Dear honoured analyst,
I would like to make you aware of an initiative that Qualcomm has made a priority.  Please advise if you would be interested in attending a briefing call that  I will be scheduling for either next week or the week after (will be in the morning Asia time, to coincide with late afternoon/early evening here in California).
The background on the topic is as follows:
HTML5 is a set of browser technology standards that enables the development of browser-based, connected applications that also can work offline, providing users with a “native app” experience.  It is emerging as an important mobile application development platform because it holds the promise for developers of lower development costs since HTML5 apps will work on any device with an HTML5-compliant browser no matter what the underlying OS.  Qualcomm is supporting developers’ need to be able to write compelling web apps by providing HTML5 device APIs.  These APIs provide access to powerful functions that reside in the Snapdragon mobile processor, which powers a significant percentage of today’s smartphones, so developers can write HTML5 apps that are on par with native apps.
Thank you in advance for your interest in Qualcomm.
Best regards,
xxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxx

Honoured analyst? Hmmmm, not so sure about that. Qualcomm has made a priority? Hmm, whatever. HTML5? Yeah thanks, I know what it is. Anyway, I replied since HTML5 is kind of interesting to me. Agreed to do the call only to receive this the day before the scheduled time;

Dear hornoured analyst:
I sincerely apologise but unfortunately we will have to postpone today’s call on HTML5 due to a scheduling conflict that we were just made aware of this morning by the spokesperson’s PR coordinator.
I am hopeful that we will be able to reschedule within the next week or so.  In the meantime, to ensure that we make the very best use of your time when we do have the call, could you please send ahead any specific questions or areas that you would to ensure that we cover?  By providing those to the spokesperson ahead of time, hopefully we can guarantee that most relevant areas are covered.
Thank you in advance and again, I am very sorry to have to reschedule at this late hour.
Best regards,
xxxxxxx

Silence ensued until today when I received (their copyrighting department seems less than creative) this email;

Dear honoured analyst,
This is a follow up to our original briefing scheduled on this topic.  We would like to reschedule for this coming Wednesday morning (Eastern Hemisphere time) .  Please advise at earliest opportunity if you can make this .
Because of the preliminary interest in this topic, I will be arranging for numerous analysts from a large variety of firms in China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, India and SE Asia Pacific to attend simultaneously.  Therefore, if you can indicate interest at first opportunity, I will be very appreciative.
The background on the topic is as follows:
HTML5 is a set of browser technology standards that enables the development of browser-based, connected applications that also can work offline, providing users with a “native app” experience.  It is emerging as an important mobile application development platform because it holds the promise for developers of lower development costs since HTML5 apps will work on any device with an HTML5-compliant browser no matter what the underlying OS.  Qualcomm is supporting developers’ need to be able to write compelling web apps by providing HTML5 device APIs.  These APIs provide access to powerful functions that reside in the Snapdragon mobile processor, which powers a significant percentage of today’s smartphones, so developers can write HTML5 apps that are on par with native apps.
Thank you in advance for your interest in Qualcomm.
Best regards,
xxxxxxx xxxxxxx

This is starting to piss me off now. I know what frigging HTML5. I’m obviously not an honoured analyst if you can’t even take the time to realize where I am or what I follow. I responded to you asking for more information and got no reply. You plan a briefing and then cancel it. You don’t give me anything substantive to indicate whether I should waste my time on dialing in or not. Sucky, sucky, sucky.

There endeth the rant.

Ben Kepes

Ben Kepes is a technology evangelist, an investor, a commentator and a business adviser. Ben covers the convergence of technology, mobile, ubiquity and agility, all enabled by the Cloud. His areas of interest extend to enterprise software, software integration, financial/accounting software, platforms and infrastructure as well as articulating technology simply for everyday users.

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