Callouts & quotes from 37,061+ activist slides

""I am proud of the accomplishments of the Board and management team." — Glenn Tilton, Lead Independent Director, April 2025; "But when you look at what we've done over the long term, we've been on a great and accelerating path to growth and enhancing our ability to return capital to shareholders." — Mark Lashier, CEO, April 2025; "I've had board members tell me that they're just stunned at the progress that we've been able to make in such a short period of time." — Mark Lashier, CEO, April 2025; "We've completed the strategic priorities that we laid out in 2022, enhanced in 2023, and committed to achieving by the end of 2024. I am proud of the work our employees have done to accomplish these important priorities and deliver on our commitments to shareholders while maintaining industry-leading safety performance." — Mark Lashier, CEO, January 2025; "You simply don't achieve results like this without a high functioning, deeply engaged board." — Bob Pease, Independent Director, March 2025"

""I am proud of the accomplishments of the Board and management team." — Glenn Tilton, Lead Independent Director, April 2025; "But when you look at what we've done over the long term, we've been on a great and accelerating path to growth and enhancing our ability to return capital to shareholders." — Mark Lashier, CEO, April 2025; "I've had board members tell me that they're just stunned at the progress that we've been able to make in such a short period of time." — Mark Lashier, CEO, April 2025; "We've completed the strategic priorities that we laid out in 2022, enhanced in 2023, and committed to achieving by the end of 2024. I am proud of the work our employees have done to accomplish these important priorities and deliver on our commitments to shareholders while maintaining industry-leading safety performance." — Mark Lashier, CEO, January 2025; "You simply don't achieve results like this without a high functioning, deeply engaged board." — Bob Pease, Independent Director, March 2025"

""Our energy marketing and retail marketing businesses remain a long-term strategic part of our portfolio that generate attractive returns..." — John Hess, CEO, Hess Corp, 11/2/12; "The Board believes that Arconic has the right strategy and is executing well on that strategy." — Pat Russo, Fmr Chair, Arconic, 4/17/17; "I would say for the long term, I'd rather be invested in a company that has that type of a portfolio balance." — Gary Heminger, Fmr CEO/Chair, Marathon Petroleum 5/8/19; "[H]aving that small cell business, we believe, is a differentiator and unique to our strategy and think that it should generate significant shareholder value" — Dan Schlanger, Fmr CFO, Crown Castle, 6/6/23; "A separation of the businesses, if it were to be pursued, may not be easy, w/ mgmt. highlighting shared digital infrastructure, investment grade credit rating and a very efficient tax rate as risk factors that must be considered." — Morgan Stanley, referencing Honeywell management meetings, 11/25/24"

""Our energy marketing and retail marketing businesses remain a long-term strategic part of our portfolio that generate attractive returns..." — John Hess, CEO, Hess Corp, 11/2/12; "The Board believes that Arconic has the right strategy and is executing well on that strategy." — Pat Russo, Fmr Chair, Arconic, 4/17/17; "I would say for the long term, I'd rather be invested in a company that has that type of a portfolio balance." — Gary Heminger, Fmr CEO/Chair, Marathon Petroleum 5/8/19; "[H]aving that small cell business, we believe, is a differentiator and unique to our strategy and think that it should generate significant shareholder value" — Dan Schlanger, Fmr CFO, Crown Castle, 6/6/23; "A separation of the businesses, if it were to be pursued, may not be easy, w/ mgmt. highlighting shared digital infrastructure, investment grade credit rating and a very efficient tax rate as risk factors that must be considered." — Morgan Stanley, referencing Honeywell management meetings, 11/25/24"

""We think like private equity people because Nelson forces us to think like private equity.. I said to another CEO that if I were to form a board today, Nelson [Peltz] would be one of the first directors I’d ask to serve... [Trian's] team had good questions and good suggestions." — Former CEO, Bill Johnson, CEO Magazine (3/08); "We have come to truly respect and highly value your impressive approach to sales and marketing, which has led to long-term shareholder value... and economic security for our members... If more companies I interacted with were able to follow the Heinz model, I believe we would have...fewer wasted resources." — Bill Dempsey, Director of UFCW Capital Stewardship, in letters to Trian dated 10/07/08 and 10/23/08; "Having activist investor Nelson Peltz on the Board of Directors has turned out to be a valuable asset. He is an operator at heart, so he asks the right questions in meetings and pushes managers to share and learn from each other." — Credit Suisse, 3/26/08"

"“They deny it. When Nevro saw my volumes drop off so substantially, they flew in a VP I had a relationship with. After bullshitting for an hour at dinner he says "So what's going on, are you not with us anymore" and I said "Guys, I’m having all these explants." And they came prepared with ammunition to try and say "Oh, here all the patients that are succeeding. The explants aren’t as high as you think they are." So I printed out an entire list of every patient I had ever implanted with them and I said "You left this person out. You left this person out. You left this person out." I went down the list and said "Of those that you say still have it, half of those don’t. And you left off all the patients that got explanted". Nevro had given him talking points to convince me to come back. So they admitted, yes, you’re getting explants, but they wanted to convince me I wasn’t getting that many. I’ve heard they’ve done this with a lot of other doctors as well.” — KOL, former Nevro implanter"

"“Currently, it's only financial support. R&D collaboration isn't really established yet. Of course, we have shares and have some power because we are one of the biggest investors, but there is no real R&D relationship or exchange or a joint lab or whatever.” — VW employee; “We don't have a real partnership or joint venture. Of course, we are one of the biggest investors, but they're also kind of scared to share intellectual property, so it's not like we have an open book policy. This is quite challenging. They are quite protective. This is making the current working mode quite challenging. Volkswagen as a mass manufacturer is also probably not the one willing to pay the most for batteries.” — VW employee; “We have no real commercial contract and obligation from Quantumscape to open all the books and to make everything transparent to us, because it's not a real partnership nor really a commercial relationship. That's why we have far more data from established suppliers” — VW employee"

""We have viewed our relationship with Philidor and our other specialty pharmacies as proprietary and as one of our competitive advantages" — Valeant Q3 2015 earnings presentation. October 19, 2015. "Philidor was not specifically mentioned in our disclosures because it had not been material to the consolidated financial statements." — Valeant investor conference call. October 26, 2015. "Ultimately we determined that the structured option acquisition with the oversight rights we negotiated provided the security we were looking for and preserved the flexibility to acquire in the future a new growth platform." — Valeant investor conference call. October 26, 2015. "The rationale to acquire the option was to keep Philidor focused on Valeant's business and to ensure continued strong customer service. The option also gave Valeant a level of contractual influence to benefit our business while providing an option on long-term ownership." — Valeant investor conference call. October 26, 2015."

""Their ability to enter the broader NGS market is limited because of the fact that they make probes for hybridization capture —targeted sequencing. The rest of the market is either of the two: one being old genome sequencing, that’s just library prep. It doesn’t involve an enrichment step. They can sell into that, but they don’t have the core competency to go after run rate business that is owned by their competition like Roche." — Former employee now at a key competitor; "The other part of the market that they can’t address is making primers, which is something that IDT does and tother companies. Their technology doesn’t really produce enough mass—and this is well-known—to make primers, which make up a significant portion of the targeted sequencing market." — Former employee now at a key competitor; "Twist just can’t make primers because their technology is limited in making the mass, the actual mass of primer that’s required to run PCR." — Former employee now at a key competitor"

""We are concerned that the accounting errors were either a function of pressure from the top, or a lack of oversight. If that is the case, and the audit committee does not do its job properly we end up with a company with weak leadership, likely to continue with poor or overly optimistic judgement. If, on the other hand, there is more to come and we see a change in leadership at PPG it could be a good thing, depending on who fills the role. It is no secret that PPG/Akzo deal broke down because of a dramatic clash of character between the Chairman of Akzo and the CEO of PPG – both sides blame each other. With the right change at PPG and with the Chairman of Akzo now gone, the deal (which makes a lot of strategic sense for both) may come back on the table. The issue would be finding a credible successor for Mr. McGarry...Reengagement with Akzo, coincident with a popular change in leadership might be very positive for PPG, but for now we remain negative." — Graham Copley-SSR, 5/13/18"

""If you can create a culture where people are motivated, inspired, incentivized, rewarded, to be honest with each other you can move mountains" — CEO Brad Jacobs, Auto Logistics Conference Sept 21, 2016; "The workers want a legally binding process to hold XPO accountable for the mistreatment" — Bill Hamilton, President of Local 107; "XPO Logistics is a rotten employer all over Europe" — International Transport Workers' Federation; "XPO's arrogance and repeated labor law violations has gone on for far too long" — Josh Zivalich, Teamsters Local 769; "XPO is mistreating us by refusing to come to the table" — Int'l Brotherhood of Teamsters; "It is time for XPO CEO Bradley Jacobs to explain to company workers why he is entitled to a huge payout while he cuts the health care and retirement benefits of workers" — Monica Abraham; "While Jacobs received $20 million mega-equity... workers are denied affordable health care" — Ernie Soehl, Director of the Teamsters National Freight Division."

"Dendrites are a real problem, and that's basically where we were at when I left—trying to solve dendrites. It's a showstopper. It's not like paint chips or something like if it happens, you have a few unhappy customers, and you can repaint their car or make them happy. It's a showstopper. The battery's not even safe if you have a short risk. Therefore, it has to be solved 100%. And therefore, the ceramic separator needs to be produced flawlessly. They need to produce hundreds of square meters per vehicle of flawless 5-micron thick separator material. That's a Herculean task. — Former R&D employee; A lithium-lithium symmetric cell is not a real battery cell...I don't believe that they have solved dendrite formation in a real battery. A single layer is nothing. Show me a multiple-layer battery, a one AH, two AH, a commercial-level battery - then I'll believe it. Their data is useless...From a commercial application point-of-view, it's too crude, too immature. — Former R&D employee"

""So the first question I have for Cord, both you and John discussed the - I guess, I'd say somewhat disconnects in your results here with sales and gross and on the EBIDTA side. You mentioned that it had to do with distributor sales from a distributed product. Can you explain further what that was? And then how we should think about that?" — Brian Nagel – Oppenheimer & Co. "...so if you look at our flea and tick category on the OTC side, we've had a historical mix in how those products have been purchased in tens and thousands of locations over the last five years... What we've seen differently is, we've sold more $32 boxes than $10 boxes. And so that's why when you look at our gross margin dollars for the quarter, they're right in line with what we thought we would have because the margin was agnostic and why the EBITDA number is online with that is we're really get our growth rate, our unit growth rate, but the mix is a little bit different." — McCord Christensen – CEO, PetIQ"

""If somebody is currently working with one of the Blues as their health plan payer, they generally have a working understanding of WIN, right, because WIN has really grown up servicing a lot of the Blue Cross Blue Shield plans right across the country. So they know who they are." — Director of Health and Benefits at Willis Towers Watson, Tegus, 4/15/22; "Kindbody has the reputation of being...an up and comer or a fast charger...They're gaining more ground...I think they just got some additional funding. They seem to be making a marketing push, right?" — Director of Health and Benefits at Willis Towers Watson, Tegus, 4/15/22; "...if you've got a large employer who's got a geographic density of employees... Kindbody can say, 'Hey, we're going to come in and we're going to stand up a fertility clinic right in your area.' So that kind of gives people good access to it and then Kindbody gets to control all the costs and all the profit there." — Former Director at PGNY, Tegus, 4/4/22"

"By proceeding to comprehensive and in-depth research, investigation and analysis on the issue of standardization of the current transaction flow in sawn wood and major wood-based panel, making reference to the relevant information in domestic and overseas timber trade standardization as well as conducting on-site investigation and study, the following five sets of standards to China’s timber trading activities were proposed by the Study and being reviewed by experts of the National Technical Committee 41 on Timber of Standardization Administration of China, which served to lay the foundation in facilitating related industry standards in the future and in establishing a well-regulated timber trading market: 1. Standardization in trading of sawn wood; 2. Standardization in trading of medium density fibreboard; 3. Standardization in trading of particle board; 4. Standardization in trading of joinery board; and 5. Standardization in trading of plywood;” — June 19, 2008 announcement"

""Bestway is a great company and compliments GFL's existing footprint in Colorado," says John Griffith, a regional vice president of GFL. "This merger is an exceptional fit for both companies, because it allows for Bestway to access to GFL's greater resources, capital, and expertise in things like safety and sustainability, while still allowing Bestway to maintain its culture of excellent customer service and its special relationship with the Colorado Springs community to remain intact. Griffith said that apart from some technological upgrades coming to Bestway's internal systems, its existing customers shouldn't notice any change in services. All of Bestway's 153 employees and management team were retained in the merger. "We are proud that all of Bestway's management and senior staff has been invited to stay post-merger and has elected to do so," Griffith says. "With the addition of the Bestway team, the future very bright for GFL in Colorado." — John Griffith, GFL Regional VP"

"Vote AGAINST approval of dividend if PBR below 1x, ROE ranking in the bottom 50 percentile in TOPIX, and "dividend ratio below 30%" — SuMi TRUST Proxy Voting Policy. If a company's total shareholder return ratios were less than 30% and ROEs were below 8% for three consecutive years (excluding net loss-making companies), we would regard it as underpaying dividends. — Asset Management One Guidelines for Exercising Voting Rights (Japanese Equities). For Japanese issuers, we are generally supportive of dividend payouts that constitute 30 percent or more of net income — STATE STREET GLOBAL ADVISORS Global Proxy Voting and Engagement Policy. We will object if the following criteria apply (...) Dividend payout ratio is less than 25% and return on capital is below the market average for a long period of time (ROE is below the median of listed companies for the last three consecutive fiscal years) — NISSAY ASSET MANAGEMENT 2025 Policy and Criteria for Exercising Voting Rights in Japan."

""LLZO is a challenging material to work with. It's a little difficult to synthesize, and it can be difficult to get good interface transport of lithium across the boundaries. It's difficult to sinter and to then sod that because, at the temperatures at which it's sintered, you tend to lose lithium. You'd probably have to do that in a CO2-free environment because if you don't, you end up with lithium carbonate at the surface, and that's a terrible lithium-ion conductor, so you might have a good lithium-ion conducting material, but then you've got a barrier layer that doesn't conduct lithium on top of it.'" — Solid state expert; "It was not smooth, but a mess"..."In 2013, the project ended in failure"..."When the battery began to cycle, the metallic lithium burrowed, atom by atom, underneath and between the mass of tiny grains that made up the LLZO. And once wedged in there, the atoms eventually broke through the material and shorted the battery." — Marker article (Steve LeVine)"

""There are two parts to the problem. One is making the ceramic separator material itself. This is something that is not that difficult, actually. And then you have to bond it and make it a thin uniform layer; that's the hard part... Lithium metal has been looked at for 50 years, and dendrites have been the bane throughout. You can't solve the problem in the absence of an engineering protocol that assures that all places in this actual cell and the quality is sufficient." — Former R&D employee; "There are two parts to the dendrites problem. One is the materials part... The other set have to do with the quality of any of the components that have lithium metal in contact with the electrolyte, and there are all sorts of issues in making sure you get every single one reliably at 100% in each cell all the time. Multiple companies have essentially gone bankrupt because of PPM-level failures in the field of these cells and dendrites and consequential explosion." — Former R&D employee"

""Confidence of our distributors is paramount. It is absolutely the number one thing... We are going through a whole process of making sure that every single thing that we do inside this company has deeper and further substantiation for the distributors, for the web, for anybody in the science industry, anybody in the health community, to make sure that they understand what this company is all about and what we’re doing. This is a company that’s out there at the University of Mississippi, University of Bonn, the University of California at Los Angeles, UCLA. We’re involved in research, development of products, we have our own research facility now in our offices in Southern California. We have doctors dedicated – this nutrition advisory board that’s unlike any other company in our field. We meet with experts on a global basis to review, to study, to understand, to build confidence and substantiation in our products on a global basis." — Michael Johnson, Herbalife CEO, 12/16/08"

"When the price was set at U.S. $220 million this meant, however, a higher price than would be applied under the pricing model in the shareholders’ agreement. The pricing model was reportedly perceived more as a reference point when the transaction was negotiated ... The future value of Coscom was deemed to be very positive. The higher price compared to an application of the pricing model in the shareholders’ agreement was motivated by the fact that Takilant was not forced to sell the shares while TeliaSonera, given a comprehensive strategy to increase their holdings in partner companies where possible, desired increase its interest ... Furthermore, the higher price was motivated by the importance of having a continued good relationship with the local partner. According to the repurchase agreement, Takilant was also provide certain services, including to assist in currency exchange—something that had proven to be a practical problem. — TeliaSonera internal document translation"

""[W]e believe BWLD company-owned stores could improve margins substantially, by up to 500 [basis points] based on our analysis, by adopting labor practices currently deployed by [franchisees]" — Jim Sanderson, Arthur Wood, 3/28/17; "Our advisor believes there is an opportunity to bring lower performers more in line with the rest of the system, with store-level labor perhaps the largest opportunity. The example of Guest Experience Captains was cited...In his experience, BWLD franchisees are as or more qualified to run a large number of restaurants than corporate personnel" — Nick Setyan, Wedbush, 2/7/17; "[Margin opportunities] exist across labor, operating expenses, and COGS...Diversified Restaurant Holdings, Buffalo Wild Wing's largest franchisee, highlights opportunity for greater margin efficiency. While there are notable differences, including geographic and overall exposure, SAUC has exhibited favorable food & labor margins relative to BWLD" — Dennis Geiger, UBS, 1/5/17"

""One thing that concerns me is the huge amount of Nevro's valuation associated with PDN. It seem like half the valuation is linked to their PDN study. That study shows amazing results, but if you look at their control it's always CMM [conservative medical management] so these studies are always a layup." — Former Nevro executive; "And then the study also doesn't compare a Lamborghini to a Ferrari. They compared a stimulator to not another stimulator, but against just medication management. It is the dumbest study design. It's greaseball. And as doctors we just shake our heads and say, "Why doesn't Nevro just come out with a normal study?" — KOL and speaker; "What assisted Nevro with the Kapural study was interaction bias. It's all about how the study was designed and how the study team interacted with patients in the Boston Scientific arm versus the Nevro arm... They compared Nevro to CMM [conservative medical management], and CMM is a very low bar." — Former Nevro executive"

"“One of the ways to cheat in batteries is to have very low loadings. So, you could have really good data, but it's not showing the same energy density or really like the same amount of charge passed that you would want to see in an electric vehicle cell.” — Solid state expert; “Apple bought a solid-state battery company, Infinite Power, that showed excellent cycle life for solid-state batteries with a lithium metal anode. I think the areal capacity was something like 100 microamp/hour. They could cycle it for a long, time. If you're only moving a very small amount of lithium, you can cycle. That's no problem. That's one of the reasons why I emphasize the absolute numbers matter. I don't want to see percentages. Just show the absolute numbers in terms of capacity.” — Solid state expert; “The nominal capacity [of the QS prototype] is 200 milliamp-hour, and if you're only 20 cycling milliamp-hour, you're only cycling 10% and this battery can last forever.” — Solid state expert"

""We use [a lower EBITDA multiple] for MPC given its relatively less desirable refining asset footprint." — Jefferies, August 2016; "Rain or Shine, Buybacks through Cycle; Upgrade to Buy." — Jefferies, March 2023; "MPC is a top-tier refining operator with commercial excellence...MPC [is our] top refining pick even after dramatic outperformance over roughly the past two years." — Raymond James, January 2023; "[With] SU's older asset base and the current rising cost environment, it could be difficult to lower operating costs." — J.P. Morgan, April 2022; "SU continues to execute well under CEO Kruger, with strong operational results at nearly every Upstream and Downstream asset...Results have been impressive across the board YTD '24, which we think is indicative of a series of smaller achievements around factors like turnaround benchmarking/efficiency and better use of physical integration, but also a change in culture at the company more broadly." — J.P. Morgan, November 2024"

"“Have you heard about the concerns around the necrotic tissue on the liver when it goes on a TransMedics device? When they put the liver on it, it’s almost upside down, and there’s some concern as there were a couple of livers where the pressure was too high and with the warm ischemic - or the normothermic perfusion and the pressure, that some of the tissue was necrotic on the outside of the liver - it was dying. But I think it was kept pretty hush-hush, and they blamed the surgeon and said they didn’t put it on the device correctly. I heard about it through a surgeon that used to do recoveries for them, and then, ultimately, he refused to do it. He’s like, ‘I’m not doing recovery for TransMedics anymore,’ because I guess when you’re doing recoveries for them, you have to sign an agreement that says you’ll never recover an organ in any other way than - as opposed to normothermic perfusion.” — CEO of a major OPO (Organ Procurement Organization), longtime industry executive"

"Analyst: “It’s supposedly when Microsoft did their ChatGPT, supposedly a lot of the annotation was done in Kenya for $3.00 an hour. I mean is there a difference in the kind of annotation you guys do versus that kind of annotation?” Jack Abuhoff: “Yes, there is. There’s a great deal of difference. Some of the early models that have been built kind of go very broad but very narrow. There’s not a great deal of annotation that’s required. Much of what we do is the complex stuff. It’s going deep into subject matter domains, it’s going deep into use cases.” — 1Q23 Earnings Call. Former Employee: “No...that’s the thing I don’t get and that’s why I say they’re spinning. They’re making more out of it than it is...I am sure that [AI] has a role in their company but I think they’re billing themselves as very much an AI company. When [at the] end of the day, 10 years ago they had 5,000 people banging away at keyboards and they still have 5,000 people banging away at keyboards [now].”"

""If we look at the acquisition, I don't think a great deal has changed on our outlook and our timing. We do obviously know more about what's going on with Rockwood. I think that if anything, we feel better about our numbers, we feel better about our synergies..." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO, December 2013; "I don't have the Rockwood acquisition up here, but, again, let me just say that I believe that that is an acquisition that is going to significantly create shareholder value... I think it's a somewhat aggressive number, but I think there's probably room to do even better than that." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO, March 2014; "A few weeks ago we successfully completed the acquisition of Rockwood's performance additives and specialty titanium dioxide businesses. As we've now had an opportunity to visit all of our sites, associates, and many of our customers, we feel stronger about this business than ever before." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO, October 2014"

""I don't think Momo will be a long lasting platform as its reputation is not good. In most peoples experience it is a live cam site for sex and this is something it cannot wash off." — Small Exclusive Agent #2; "Momo is good for publicity. Most people think of Momo as a sex site which has predominantly male users." — Super Agency #6; "A successful broadcaster on Yizhibo would not survive on Momo. Momo is low level. Momo was successful because it was like a porn cam channel. The users were 30 to 50 year old males in second and third tier cities. Their motives were clear. They wanted to see sex performances. Despite being cleaned up Momo is still this sort of channel and encourages people to climax. If Momo can not change directions then it will have a problem." — Small Agency #9; "90% of the audience are male. They are not interested in art but more about sex. Older men with their families in the US. They are lonely and spend a lot of money each month." — Large Agency #11"

""There are a ton of competitors in payments. There are so many third-party providers. Their main competitor I would say is Square, who is very transaction and for the small merchants that do not need inventory management. You are really competing against third-party venders who have all these hidden fees behind what they say the rate is. People are very rate sensitive so there is an initial sticker shock. The other approach that Lightspeed takes is offering a flat rate, you know what to expect every month. There is a big portion of education that I believe they need to do a lot of work on in order to help the product take off." — Former Employee Interview; "It's several hundred, Todd, that we signed in the quarter. It's still pretty early on. So, yeah, less than 1,000." — CFO Nussey, Q4 2019 Earnings Conf Call; "Payments penetration continues to increase with approximately 10% of our GTV processed through our payment solutions." — CEO Dasilva, Q1 2022 Earnings Conf Call"

""We see Starboard stake as a positive – We see the news as a positive as the involvement of an activist further validates the opportunity for value creation at Autodesk." — Citi, June 2024. "We believe Autodesk is a good business that has the potential for multiple expansion due to improved execution... most tend to agree that Autodesk is a great company, but one that needs to improve its execution, investor messaging and margins." — RBC Capital, June 2024. "ADSK has close to a monopolistic market position in AEC software and believe an activist can have ADSK increase its focus on efficiency as it undergoes its agency model transition." — Wolfe Research, June 2024. "The company’s billing system transition, transaction model change and recent financial audit all add complexity and uncertainty. Starboard’s involvement may provide an opportunity for investors to gain greater confidence and clarity and for management to engage with investors." — BofA Securities, June 2024."

"“Omni rolled out in Q3 2019. We’re seeing it all over social media. Doctors are saying Omnia’s a good battery, that it gives them options but that the results are no better than anyone’s else. They got some more play with it. One of our doctors will do a couple of cases with it and see how it goes. You have your Nevro loyalists like [name redacted] and [name redacted] who are being paid. They’re on their studies. Every day doctors though have gotten smarter and use everyone’s device. Omnia isn’t impacting the market by letting them capture market share. Doctors use everyone. They’re not loyal. The only loyal ones are ones being paid a lot of money to put in devices. Everyone gets their piece of the pie.” — Territory manager at one of Nevro’s 3 key competitors; “Are they shifting share from Boston Scientific with Omnia? I doubt it because Boston Scientific, their IPG, has those capabilities, and I think their programming is better.” — Longtime executive in the SCS space"

""We have always struggled with US onshore asset as in our view they do not fit in BHP's strategy of building large scale low cost tier 1 assets and are arguably worth more to someone else." — Citigroup; "Has the time come to take the BHP devolution further than just S32? In the last 6 months S32 has outperformed its parent by >30%." — Credit Suisse; "BHP's US Onshore assets promised so much but have delivered so little" — Deutsche Bank; "Since 2005, BHP has spent $7.9b on petroleum exploration, of which $4.9b has been expensed. However, since BHP's last prolific find with Shenzi in 2002, the Petroleum exploration team has been unsuccessful in achieving their goal of a tier 1, large scale, oil find." — Bank of America; "On strategy, we think there is no real benefit from portfolio diversification per se and unless we see a dramatic outperformance of oil versus iron ore (clearly not the case at present) we see no reason for BHP to trade ahead of Rio Tinto." — Bernstein."

"“BlackRock was a founding member of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD)...This year, we are asking the companies that we invest in on behalf of our clients to... disclose climate-related risks in line with the TCFD’s recommendations, if you have not already done so.” — 2020 Letter to the CEOs, BlackRock. “In 2021, we initiated a review of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) disclosure requirements, and we are evaluating additional disclosures in the future that will align with TCFD.” — Huntsman Corporation 2021 Proxy Statement. “In 2021, we completed an analysis of the Task Force for Climate-Related Disclosures (TCFD) and will begin to disclose along the TCFD in our next Sustainability Report...We believe moving to a low-carbon economy will make both society and the environment more sustainable. Accordingly, we announced our goal to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.” — Huntsman Corporation 2022 Proxy Statement."

""BlackRock was a founding member of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD)...This year, we are asking the companies that we invest in on behalf of our clients to... disclose climate-related risks in line with the TCFD’s recommendations, if you have not already done so." — 2020 Letter to the CEOs, BlackRock. "In 2021, we initiated a review of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) disclosure requirements, and we are evaluating additional disclosures in the future that will align with TCFD." — Huntsman Corporation 2021 Proxy Statement. "In 2021, we completed an analysis of the Task Force for Climate-Related Disclosures (TCFD) and will begin to disclose along the TCFD in our next Sustainability Report...We believe moving to a low-carbon economy will make both society and the environment more sustainable. Accordingly, we announced our goal to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050." — Huntsman Corporation 2022 Proxy Statement."

"“I was involved in the decision to buy it, in 2019... The idea was to speed things up in terms of antibody discovery, with Beacon.” — Harbour Biomed ex-executive; “Yes, because again, as I said, the cost of operating it, the amount of time that we were spending troubleshooting and learning, and finally, at the end of the day, the amount of benefit that we were receiving was just not a good return on investment.” — Harbour Biomed ex-executive; “In terms of expectations against reality, I would say it's somewhere around the 50% hit or miss rate.” — Harbour Biomed ex-executive; “But given that each run ran $15,000 to $17,000, we were apprehensive about spending that kind of money on it. But from the get-go, to go in with that kind of pricing, not being able to get the level of data and output that you're expecting, I think that probably didn't work out in the right way, and the marketing tactics and the support that they decided to have.” — Harbour Biomed ex-executive"

"Jack Smith – Chief Product Officer: "So as an example, we used our existing customer relationships and footprint to drive 89% adoption of authentic brand suitability with our top 100 customers." — Analyst Day Feb 24, 2022; CEO Zagorski: "Beyond our top 100 customers, approximately 40% of our top 500 clients still do not use ABS in any market, representing a solid expansion opportunity amongst this established customer base." — Q4 2021 Call March 8, 2022; CFO Allais: "Yes. So it's 40% of the top 700 that we work with today." — Canaccord Call May 13, 2022; CEO Zagorski: "And we continue to grow ABS activation beyond our top 100 customers. In the third quarter, approximately 63% of our top 500 customers activated ABS." — Q3 2022 Call Nov 8, 2022; CEO Zagorski: "We expect ABS to continue to grow given that 35% of our top 500 customers have yet to activate this industry-leading solution, and ABS innovations continue to create growth opportunities." — Q4 2022 March 2023"

"“I would say not, mostly because of what I was talking about before. I think Ginkgo is overvalued. I can't understand the basis for the hype...Like I said before, you have to be able to—I think you have to be differentiated in some way to be competing against...Let's take a step back. Think about DNA sequencing. There was a point where that was something special, and people would do it in-house.. And now it's become effectively commoditized. So, what's differentiating about DNA sequencing? Maybe you have enormous capacity, or maybe you have super, super-fast turnaround, or maybe you're the backend, but it's hard to be special as a sequencing company. And I worry that some of the other elements of synthetic biology, as people talk about it industrially, are a little bit that they are ripe to be commoditized. What I don't have a vision of for Ginkgo is what is it about them that's going to be in that context is going to be differentiating?” — Current Joyn executive"

""Towards the end of the quarter, we also closed on the strategic acquisition of Utiba, a small developer of payment-related technology in the emerging markets. Utiba was acquired for $20 million in cash and the revenue contribution for the quarter was immaterial." — Tamar Rapaport-Dagim, CFO, Amdocs; "Important to our geographic expansion, we're also focused on bringing innovation to the market as another dimension of our long-term growth, both in terms of new products and new services. Along these lines, in the first quarter, Amdocs [launched] mobile financial services solutions, MFS, a new offering resounding from our internal R&D investment and the acquisition of Utiba, which we completed in the second quarter of FY14." — Tamar Rapaport-Dagim, CFO, Amdocs; "When it comes to mobile financial services, it's also in the tens of millions of dollars already was – some of it came from M&A, some of it came from new projects." — Eli Gelman, President and CEO, Amdocs"

""So if you go anywhere in the world and you order McDonald hamburger is gonna taste like a McDonald hamburger, right? And the reason behind that is they have an infrastructure and an ingredients and a process that they've really dialed in so they can get predictable results wherever they go... there's no secret that they have stumbled with new offices and, and that, that would be an ongoing concern is, you know, they're hiring people from bigger BPOs who have seen that and wanna put that into place. Um, but it's tricky." — Fmr Business Dev. Employee. "All the BPOs servicing Facebook, and I'm not sure but probably at least a dozen, are doing low margins just to have the name, to learn, and leverage that name in their sales efforts. It's not uncommon for BPOs to take a haircut or even a loss for the first year or two for a long-term relationship. Now with wages increasing, it throws a bomb in the middle of everyone's strategic plan." — Fmr Business Dev. Employee."

"“I would say that I know this is going to sound maybe cynical, but I'm overall, when it comes to rare diseases like this, I would say I'm skeptical in terms of if it's going to be successful or not, because number one, these are very rare diseases. How much benefit are we going to get from this? Number two, I'm aware of what diazoxide is. So, it's kind of like, hmm. Diazoxide can be problematic for other reasons. I would say you have to be cautious about it because there can be some not very good side effects. And since it's such a rare disease, I don't know what good of a power these clinical trials are going to have because they're going to have a low amount of patients since it's a rare disease. There's going to be problems with the study trial design itself, the power of the study, how much statistical significance is going to be there? It's all rather difficult to say. That's the reason for my hesitancy.” — Endocrinologist at Massachusetts General Hospital"

"I do and I always debate with myself about whether I should even have the rep in the room when a patient discussion is going on. It is a valid concern. The rep is kind of an extension of your practice. I've seen some really egregious things where the feedback is really negative about what the rep did in terms of steering a patient that was unsure and pushing them towards implant. The reps will certainly try to be there every time because that's their opportunity to steer the conversation. My concern is that they're potentially doing things that I don't like, on the phone with he patient. Sometimes practices don't have a bandwidth to engage with their patient every day for a week. The rep gives text message updates saying "Hey Mr. Jones is going great" and then you call Mr. Jones and he's like "Oh no I am doing terrible. I don't like this". Sometimes the doc is not really paying attention. They start to get misinformation. — KOL and high volume Nevro implanter"

""Darden also issued its most detailed defense of its planned spin-off (or sale) of Red Lobster. However, it remains unclear to us why the combined valuation of the separate companies would exceed current DRI valuation." — BofA Merrill Lynch, March 3, 2014; "...But we continue to believe [management's] plan doesn't address RL problems for investors... It is still unclear how a spin actually improves core guest targeting capabilities/chances for a sales recovery or why multiple expansion would occur." — UBS, March 3, 2014; "We fear management's current plan to spinoff Red Lobster is reactionary and lacking integrity. They haven't given a plan to stabilize and turnaround Red Lobster, but merely an excuse to cast off the struggling chain." — Hedgeye, March 12, 2014; "Despite Opposition, Management is Moving Forward in Divesting Red Lobster: Overall, we believe the Street is disappointed by the divestiture of Red Lobster on its own." — Sterne Agee, March 21, 2014"

"“But for the ops disruption, we would have had a very strong profit in the first quarter. Second quarter, our guide is really strong.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “You know, the quarter was great ... We’re predicting record revenues again in the third quarter. Record passengers. Record flights.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “We had a great quarter in the third quarter. We’re forecasting record revenue and record passengers again for the fourth quarter.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “We had a great 2023. Record operating revenue, record passengers, record loyalty revenue.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “I am extremely proud of our progress and accomplishments in 2023—we ended the year a better Company...” — CEO Bob Jordan in 2024 Proxy Statement; “We had a strong first quarter, despite the financial results.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “I’m very proud of the Company’s progress in 2023 ... we entered 2024 a stronger company.” — CEO Bob Jordan at Annual Shareholder Meeting"

"“But for the ops disruption, we would have had a very strong profit in the first quarter. Second quarter, our guide is really strong.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “You know, the quarter was great ... We’re predicting record revenues again in the third quarter. Record passengers. Record flights.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “We had a great quarter in the third quarter. We’re forecasting record revenue and record passengers again for the fourth quarter.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “We had a great 2023. Record operating revenue, record passengers, record loyalty revenue.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “I am extremely proud of our progress and accomplishments in 2023—we ended the year a better Company...” — CEO Bob Jordan in 2024 Proxy Statement; “We had a strong first quarter, despite the financial results.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “I’m very proud of the Company’s progress in 2023 ... we entered 2024 a stronger company.” — CEO Bob Jordan at Annual Shareholder Meeting"

"“But for the ops disruption, we would have had a very strong profit in the first quarter. Second quarter, our guide is really strong.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “You know, the quarter was great ... We’re predicting record revenues again in the third quarter. Record passengers. Record flights.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “We had a great quarter in the third quarter. We’re forecasting record revenue and record passengers again for the fourth quarter.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “We had a great 2023. Record operating revenue, record passengers, record loyalty revenue.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “I am extremely proud of our progress and accomplishments in 2023—we ended the year a better Company...” — CEO Bob Jordan in 2024 Proxy Statement; “We had a strong first quarter, despite the financial results.” — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; “I’m very proud of the Company’s progress in 2023 ... we entered 2024 a stronger company.” — CEO Bob Jordan at Annual Shareholder Meeting"

""And the idea that somebody has publicly said repeatedly that it is going to go direct-to-consumer, and you're signing up to that type of long-term deal. It also -- that's untenable." — Chris Winfrey, Charter CEO, September 1, 2023; "On the negative side, Iger's open and honest disclosure about his worries about the long-term health of the linear networks has frustrated the market because it wasn't matched by an immediate action step. As such, we have been needlessly left wondering and postulating about assets that are no longer drivers of future company earnings." — Michael Nathanson, MoffettNathanson, November 9, 2023; "Sometimes, when I am looking for a reaction to my own thought process, I like to test that process in public, particularly in ways that I might be able to get a reaction from the investment community. So my thought was at the time that I would essentially be public with that thought process." — Robert A. Iger, CEO & Director, November 2023"

""But for the ops disruption, we would have had a very strong profit in the first quarter. Second quarter, our guide is really strong." — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; "You know, the quarter was great ... We're predicting record revenues again in the third quarter. Record passengers. Record flights." — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; "We had a great quarter in the third quarter. We're forecasting record revenue and record passengers again for the fourth quarter." — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; "We had a great 2023. Record operating revenue, record passengers, record loyalty revenue." — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; "I am extremely proud of our progress and accomplishments in 2023—we ended the year a better Company..." — CEO Bob Jordan in 2024 Proxy Statement; "We had a strong first quarter, despite the financial results." — CEO Bob Jordan on CNBC; "I'm very proud of the Company's progress in 2023 ... we entered 2024 a stronger company." — CEO Bob Jordan at Annual Shareholder Meeting"

""And the idea that somebody has publicly said repeatedly that it is going to go direct-to-consumer, and you're signing up to that type of long-term deal. It also -- that's untenable." — Chris Winfrey, Charter CEO, September 1, 2023; "On the negative side, Iger's open and honest disclosure about his worries about the long-term health of the linear networks has frustrated the market because it wasn't matched by an immediate action step. As such, we have been needlessly left wondering and postulating about assets that are no longer drivers of future company earnings." — Michael Nathanson, MoffettNathanson, November 9, 2023; "Sometimes, when I am looking for a reaction to my own thought process, I like to test that process in public, particularly in ways that I might be able to get a reaction from the investment community. So my thought was at the time that I would essentially be public with that thought process." — Robert A. Iger, CEO & Director, November 2023"

"“I would say that maybe those true religious zealots to Waleed represent 50% of the business.” — Prominent transplant surgeon, leadership role at a West Coast academic transplant center; “Mayo in Arizona is their biggest center, and the second-biggest center is Methodist in Houston. Arizona might be doing 180 livers a year, something like that, with a pump. And then, Houston, maybe 100, 110.” — Transplant surgeon and division chief of the liver program at a world-renowned academic center; “Those are the biggest users that I know. And I think that MGH in Boston, I don’t know now that the chief of MGH is gone. He moved to UPenn, but the chief at MGH was one of the PIs for the initial trial, the PROTECT trial. They were using the pump in a fair number of patients. I also know that Henry Ford in Detroit, he was also using the machine quite a bit. Marwan Abouljoud.” — Transplant surgeon and division chief of the liver program at a world-renowned academic center."

"“Dendrites are a real problem, and that’s basically where we were at when I left - trying to solve dendrites. It’s a showstopper.” — Former employee #1; “A lithium-lithium symmetric cell is not a real battery cell...I don’t believe that they have solved dendrite formation in a real battery. A single layer is nothing.” — Former employee #2; “You’re balancing thickness versus number of defects; the defects are the ones with the dendrites.... They were having problems at the coin cell level...it is a very difficult problem.” — Former employee #3; “I don’t know that they’ve completely nailed this. I wouldn’t say that they’ve completely nailed this because there are definitely some issues with what they’ve put out.” — Former employee #4; “[The CEO’s dendrites claim] is a bunch of bullshit ...That’s definitely bullshit...it’s not going to be representative of what you will see in an actual cell...this is just not going to hold good at all.” — Former employee #5"

"The heart of the growth algorithm, as you've heard from us, is really around the cross-sell momentum, okay, the cross-sell opportunity. — CFO Eric Shander; But just going through motions of a cross-sell we talked about, on average, getting our customers from 2 to 4 products, we can grow 10% for the next 10 years. Just by getting a $1, we can continue to grow 10% every year. That's how much exciting cross the momentum and how much white space is there. — CEO Hardeep Gulati; So in any given quarter, anywhere from 65% to 85% of our business comes from our existing customer base. And yet, only 70% -- and 70% of them only have 2 or 1 products. So there's a great opportunity to sell more into our customer base. If we just did that, we can grow to Hardeep's point organically. — CRO Tony Kender; risks related to the unavailability of additional U.S. federal government stimulus packages focused on educational initiatives following the COVID-19 pandemic — 2023 10-K"

"“...only recently has CMS initiated changes to the regulations to address IDTFs like iRhythm that furnish “indirect tests” that do not require in-person interaction and involve technicians performing computer analyses offsite or at another location. The changes, however, do not address all gaps identified by CMS relating to IDTF operations and the Medicare billing requirements. For example, CMS has not addressed billing for remote diagnostic tests that are performed from one or more IDTF or other remote locations. Our failure to comply with the applicable Medicare regulations, or regulators’ disagreement with our interpretation of the regulations as applied to indirect tests, such as the Zio Services, could result in the discontinuation of our reimbursement under the Medicare program, a requirement to return funds already paid to us, civil monetary penalties, criminal penalties, and/or exclusion from the Medicare program.” — Excerpt From iRhythm 2024 10-K"

"“Amdocs is currently evaluating various alternatives with respect to the future development and construction of the new campus, including structures for ownership or long-term lease arrangements. The acquisition costs are not expected to have a material impact on Amdocs' cash position or operating results.” — Press Release Sept 13, 2017; “This investment, if consummated, will be financed from internal cash resources. Moreover, we believe our decision to build a new campus will be accretive to non-GAAP diluted earnings per share over the long term and is a reflection of our confidence in the future success of Amdocs.” — Tamar Rapaport-Dagim, CFO, Amdocs; “During fiscal year 2018, as a result of funding decisions for the construction of the Company's new campus in Israel, see also Note 2, the Company recorded a tax benefit of $28,795 related to the release of withholding and income tax reserves for unremitted earnings.” — FY 2018 20-F page F-30 Dec 10, 2018"

""We have exclusive arrangements with people like the English Premier League, the number one most bet sporting league and activity in the world, and we also of course have exclusive deals with players in the US like the NCAA." — Niccolo de Masi - CEO DMYD, Interview with Benzinga (Dec. 23rd, 2020); "One of Genius Sports' subsidiaries, Betgenius, offers services to betting operators in the United States and internationally, including a sportsbook management platform and digital marketing. The partnership with the NCAA does not include any betting rights, a Genius Sports spokesperson told ESPN." — ESPN (May 14th, 2018); "Yes, no one else can have scouts in venue, but that doesn't mean that another supplier can't scout off of TV. So just because Genius could have scouts in venue for NCAA basketball doesn't mean that Sportradar couldn't scout off of the TV feed or something else." — Sales Director, U.S. Betting Division at Sportradar, Source: Tegus (3/5/2021)"

"“I think Twist is not profitable because I was shocked when you mentioned the pricing of 7 cents to 10 cents a base pair. At that rate, I don’t think they will ever be profitable. I think they may be doing that to increase market share, maybe doing some kind of marketing campaign to win the market.” — Executive at Genscript, key Twist competitor; “Back in 2019, when Twist came into the space, it was about 50 cents per base pair for GenScript, and now we’re down to like 35 cents per base pair.” — Executive at Genscript, key Twist competitor; “I don’t know anyone today who would be pricing at 20 cents per base pair. I think that’s a thing of the past, and actually, I don’t remember this being that expensive. Some companies charge more for more complex genes. Certain gene sequences are harder to synthesize. I think 9 cents is very reasonable. There are lost-cost providers that can do things in China for maybe 7 cents.” — Abbvie R&D Director; Twist customer"

"“As we continue to consolidate and grow relative market share throughout our footprint, our business scales and margins expand.” — CEO Smith, Q2 2023; “Michael, it's interesting. We're in a relative market share business. So in the markets that we compete in, and we see this because SunTx invests really in the Sunbelt of the country. There is some -- continues to be a lot of growth. The demographic trends are driving that, number one; and number 2, the business trends are driving that. So in a relative market share business, what we're worried about is the growth in Raleigh-Durham, the growth in Huntsville, Alabama. And in each of these 70-plus distinct markets, we continue to see growth commercially, residentially, everything.” — Chairman Fleming, Q4 2023; “Finally, we completed 8 acquisitions in fiscal 2024 that expanded our geographic footprint into new growth markets and enhanced relative market share across our Sunbelt states.” — CEO Smith, Q4 2024"

""We view nearly all aspects of the Red Lobster transaction as not particularly compelling." — UBS, May 20, 2014; "Who Knew Lobsters Had Middle Fingers?" — Janney Capital Markets, May 16, 2014; "Destroying a business and giving it away for free is a familiar practice for CEO Clarence Otis." — Hedgeye, May 16, 2014; "We could get to valuations as high as $3.1billion for [Red Lobster], and, particularly considering how tax-inefficient the transaction will be, believe that it was not the best course of action for shareholders." — Credit Suisse, May 20, 2014; "the taxman stole the show" — Stifel, May 16, 2014; "Management's decision to ignore shareholder concerns and go forth with an undervalued sale of Red Lobster... will likely result in meaningful changes at the board level and among senior management." — Buckingham, May 16, 2014; "Count us among the many who believe DRI is destroying shareholder value with this deal" — New Albion Partners, May 19, 2014"

""And to your second question on color on churn in the quarter, we don't disclose churn on a regular basis. We did provide some color on gross retention rates as part of the IPO process. Churn for us has been stable and improving for many quarters and for a long period of time." — CFO Vashee, Q2 2018 Conference Call; "Our latest outlook incorporates some really positive early signals related to both conversion and churn that we're seeing. And the second thing I will say, we provided some color on churn back when we went public last year. Directionally, churn has been very stable for us since then. It did, in fact, improve across the business in Q2, so those rates have improved." — CFO Vashee, Q2 2019 Conference Call; "Because we're such an important part of how our users get work done and we're mission critical to so many business workflows, our churn rates have remained very stable, in the mid-teens, since our IPO." — CFO Vashee, Analyst Day Sept 2019"

"“As soon as I saw that, I knew it was a story, right? [for Wall Street]. In the Bay area, she’s got the most expensive labor... I can’t imagine it’s fundamentally going to change their operational efficiency or be profitable, for that matter. I think she’s just going to add a second site. Add a bunch of new costs and redundancies unless they’re at capacity, which I would be shocked. It’s unnecessary. It just fills into a story that I think Wall Street wants to hear.” — Longtime executive in Twist’s space; “The plan is—as you’ve probably seen—that the factory of the future was eventually going to take over anything of what was being built and manufactured in south San Francisco... I think we’re in the middle of it—in which you’re going to have artificial double expenses because you are producing in one place for real in south San Francisco and you have basically everything in place as you test and whatnot. That’s an anomaly there.” — Ex-Twist executive"