Monday, November 9, 2009

GetMondo or GizFugu?: Carl Freer Appointed President of GetFugu

Enhanced mobile search marketing company, GetFugu (GFGU), filed an 8-K with the SEC on Friday to handle a bunch of housekeeping, the most notable item being the appointment of the company's largest shareholder (21%) and Co-Founder, Carl Freer, as President and board member. As part of the board appointment, Freer was granted 2mil options at a strike price of $0.37 (today's stock price) vesting over 3 years. Freer is (in)famous for his association with Gizmondo, the connected handheld gaming device he launched back in 2002, while Chairman of Tiger Telematics. The rise and dramatically scandalicious fall of that platform, the company, and some of the colorful characters associated with it, are the stuff of console and mobile games industry legend... giving rise to an extensive Wired article back in 2006 that, as I reported back in May, is currently being developed into a film.

The 8-K also addressed the settlement of pending litigation against the company from spurned investor SpongeTech (SPNG). It looks like GetFugu was able to make SpongeTech happy by issuing 5.25mil shares of common stock to an associated holding company, R.M. Enterprises International, in exchange for retaining the $1.75mil advance deposit it received during the investment negotiation process. GetFugu also has issued 20mil shares to two former company advisors, Amber Capital Corporation and Summit Trading Limited, to settle outstanding compensation claims. These two items lead one to believe that the company, in the wake of the commercial rollout of its app, is trying to clean up its act a bit to make it more attractive to additional investors or, potentially, an acquirer. But, if that's the case then the Freer move is a bizarre one... as you will see from several comments to my previous GetFugu posts, he's a polarizing character, to say the least.
Posted by Jeremy Laws at 12:28 PM
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7 comments:

  1. AnonymousNovember 10, 2009 at 10:18 AM

    check out the movie "riot-on" why making another movie. Same story again and again. Big money kills business!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Jeremy LawsNovember 10, 2009 at 11:22 AM

    @Anonymous - thanks for the tip about Riot On!... I'm dying to see it. I was unaware that there was a film about the Riot E scandal. Maybe I'll post a review once I've seen it.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousNovember 10, 2009 at 12:11 PM

    I received the tip on the movie from a presentation of Handygames long time ago the movie is just fantastic a must for everyone working in the industry. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427783/

    Some small parts of the movie is on youtube just search for: "riot-e Hakalax" Hakalax was the production company and of course part of riot-e. Try to get it. I found it after a long hard search in Australia!

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousNovember 11, 2009 at 1:05 PM

    Carl Freer is a genius, as is his product GFGU, watch this product become the next Google.

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousFebruary 27, 2010 at 6:35 PM

    I heard they not paying their employees.

    ReplyDelete
  6. AnonymousMarch 5, 2010 at 12:53 PM

    It's true, they actually hired a ton of people, got a ton of work done, and then just didn't pay. They won't return a call, no human actually answers phones over there, it's a joke all around.

    ReplyDelete
  7. AnonymousMarch 27, 2010 at 10:34 AM

    Carl Freer is a genius? C'mon. Seriously? He's a glorified used car-salesman, a fraud, and he operates with no integrity. The next Google? RIGHT! He's torn through tens of millions of dollars and driven the price down from a few dollars to a few cents. He owes tens of thousands of dollars to ex-employees and contractors and has no intention of settling up. Don't be naive or misleading.

    ReplyDelete

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