Local Tech Firms Are Left Battle-Scarred, but Surviving
Varsity Group Inc. had only been public a month when founder Eric J. Kuhn walked into a March 2000 board meeting with a doomsday declaration.</br></br>"Unless we make radical changes we're going to be out of business in six months," Kuhn told the assembled board members.</br></br>The Internet textbook seller had gone public at $10 a share, but by the end of the month it was trading at less than half that, with most of its $207 million market value wiped out.</br></br>Kuhn did not know it then, but Varsity Group's debut came at the peak of the Nasdaq Stock Market's composite index, which hit 5,060 three years ago today. As the market slid to its dramatic crash April 14, Varsity found itself rocketing down the same curve.</br></br>The company managed to transform itself and survive, unlike many of its Internet and technology brethren. While others were gobbled up by competitors or failed spectacularly, those that endured did so by taking dramatic action: They abandoned business models, hoarded cash and cut workforces to the bone.