Interesting times for the World Triathlon Corporation, owners of the Ironman brand. As 1) a repeat Ironman competitor myself, at both full (140.6) and 70.3 distances, 2) a professional who works with brands everyday and 3) respects the Ironman brand… although I don’t have it tattooed on me… it’s intriguing to watch the stumbles made by WTC this year.

Ironman is one of the most revered human performance brands on the planet. Not only is it an extraordinary test of individual physical achievement and endurance, it’s one of the only sports where normal people can line up alongside world champions on the starting line. Because of what it takes to just complete an Ironman, competitors are passionate about the mark, as they are about the sport of triathlon. It’s a lot more than a Sunday afternoon thumb exercise to do a triathlon. And to complete an Ironman is a huge commitment for an individual, and usually for their family. So finishers, rightfully or not, feel they own a piece of the brand, which is why you see so many M-dot tattoos on competitors. Additionally, the sport of triathlon is exploding – as these stats from usatriathlon.org show.

In 2010, in addition to launching several new full Ironman and 70.3 series events, here is what WTC has done:

• They launched a magazine, Lava. OK… with the dead tree business in decline WTC is going against the grain. How many magazines has Conde Nast, Time Warner or Hearst launched in 2010. A better question would be – how many did they fold? Look, Ironman is trying, and  I suppose WTC could know the print business better than the aforementioned publishers, however isn’t it a matter of priorities and resource management? Ironman’s website truly does not do the brand justice. Especially when you compare it to any other major sports brand such as the NBA, MLB or NHL, or even the sport’s governing body usatriathlon.org or Slowtwitch, a site that does a phenomenal job of covering the sport of triathlon. Add to that underwhelming video coverage of events, weak social network integration, no iPhone or Android Apps, no iPad App. But a magazine… ok… why was that a priority again? Ego battle with Triathlete magazine perhaps? Ironman is not in the content creation, content packaging and content distribution business – it’s a brand licensing and brand marketing business. But if you’re going to play in or make a bet in the content world – better to make that bet with a medium that is growing (mobile), rather  than contracting (print).
• 5i50 or is it 5150. I’m confused. Is that still an Ironman, or what. Ironman is a platinum brand. Diluting the brand, devaluing the brand equity correspondingly devalues the enterprise. Earlier this month, WTC announced a new series of Olympic distance races called the 5i50. Sure WTC wants a piece of the action in shorter, entry level events – what’s next, Sprint distance races? The number of triathlons in the US alone has grown from 800 per year a decade ago to over 1800 today, so inevitably some Sprint-esque WTC event series will follow the 5i50 announcement. This only serves to weaken the core Ironman brand. Maybe you’ve heard of baseball… it’s played everywhere. But there is only one World Series. Find a way to work with the shorter races – provide entries to various IM events for series winners in regions. In other words, support the feeder, aspirational races to the benefit of the IM brand. But don’t steamroll them or be threatened by them and try to own the sport entirely. Nurture and protect the Ironman brand.
• It’s evidence of a systemic problem when the three-time Kona winner speaks out against World Triathlon Corporation. Such was the case earlier this year, when Chrissie Wellington, Kona’s 2007-2009 Women’s champ wrote this thoughtful and articulate post taking WTC to task for performance levels, registration fees and prize money. Ironman made Chrissie Wellington, but now Ironman needs her to be an inspiration for others to aspire to her level of success, and WTC needs her to be a proponent of the Ironman brand, not a detractor. Good for her for speaking out.
• And lastly… Wednesday evening I received an e-mail invitation to a new Ironman “Access” program. For a $1000 annual membership, I would be given opportunities to register in advance for selected IM events, 2 VIP passes per registered event, a one year subscription to Lava magazine(!), a 2011 Lottery entry and second chance, a 2010 Kona DVD, 20% off IM merch and a membership card. I don’t need to say how I felt. Triathlon is already an expensive sport. $550 to enter an event. You typically have to sign up a year in advance of an event. There is no transfer policy or rollover policy if you can’t make a race. I was supposed to race in the Ironman at Couer d’Alene in Idaho this past June, but couldn’t because of a foot injury encountered earlier in the year. I would have given… given my registration to another athlete to enjoy but couldn’t. I’ve recovered enough to do Ironman Florida this November, but that’s beside the point. WTC is owned by Providence Equity, a Private Equity firm which purchased WTC in 2008. Like any good PE, they’re probably looking for 50-100% ROI per year, as they should… that’s their business. If it feels like WTC stands for We’ll Take (Your) Cash, that’s why. Last night, I received a second e-mail, with a link to a video from Ben Fertic, WTC’s CEO. 24 hours later, Ironman canceled Access, as a result of the howling negative reaction to the program. So did WTC float Access or test a response to the program across a group of active Ironman competitors. Was the $500K the program might have drawn in worth the beating the brand and WTC took? Wouldn’t the time developing Access have better spent working on product licensing, sponsorship, applying positive attributes to the brand through Mobile Apps,or tweaking the site perhaps??? Maybe these tactics are all in progress. If not, my company would be pleased to help.

The fact is, Ironman is not Coke. People don’t tattoo a Coke logo on their legs, arms, neck or torso. They don’t define who they are through the mark on a can of soda. But they do with the M-dot, the Ironman logo. As a brand, Ironman needs to protect the incredible equity entrenched in that logo, and bounce every dumbass idea for the growth, pimping and exploitation of the brand against a series of enshrined core values. And it’s a challenge, to Watch The Core… to preserve the core brand equity and grow the business. But then, so is 140.6 miles of swimming, biking and running.

We announced a new strategic partnership today, with Jetmind Technologies. Jetmind is a New York-based software development company, with deep expertise in iOS (iPhone/iPad) and Android mobile development. Our clients and prospective clients had been looking for a trusted app developer, and we’re pleased to now offer these services. Jetmind has already done work for The Home Depot on Android, and has had a top ranking game in the App Store in Color Wars. Their dev and UI talent is best demonstrated in their content, consumer products, social network, health and financial services, sports and games apps. It aligns with our own core competencies in those sectors, and enhances our dev services already available in CMS development, PHP, JS, Flash and HTML5. Take a look at a small portfolio of their apps and if you’re looking to enter the Android or iOS mobile markets with your product, or with an app tied to your company’s services, let us show you how efficient and cost-effective Jetmind’s development resources can be for your enterprise.

It’s hard to consign a once vibrant and innovative company to the technology graveyard, but Motorola is clearly in a death spiral. The company that brought us the StarTAC and DynaTAC cell phones, 6800 and 68000 series microprocessors that powered early Apple, Atari, and Amiga personal computers, invented Six Sigma quality standards, introduced the first high powered germanium transistor, not to mention key developments in television, satellite and space technology is marching toward its inevitable demise.Let’s look at its business units:

Home & Networks Mobility

An entrenched customer base in Cable MSOs, but slow development and long time horizons for installed cable boxes mean that there is not significant demand for product innovation by the cable operators or consumers, and during the downturn, cable is likely to work harder to hold customers, while having a harder time upselling new features such as DVRs etc. Motorola is clearly several generations behind any comparable home entertainment technology standard. Compare the sophistication of a Motorola to AppleTV, a product that, with its peerless DNA, has still struggled to find relevance. I have a Comcast set top box made by Motorola, with a DVR, deployed last August. It sits in a room on top of an 8 year old Sony Home Entertainment DVD/Surround Sound System. 20 feet away, on my stereo rack is a 3 year old Roku Soundbridge. The Motorola box works, but it can’t compete with the Sony or Roku for refinement or product maturity. Any of the display commands on the STB (Play, Pause) are truncated to PLA or PAU – again, this is a 2008 device. Meanwhile the Sony system has a clear, bright, and fully informative display, as does the Roku, where the florescent readout is one of the most elegant in the CE sector… from a company whose market cap is a rounding error in comparison to Motorola.

Enterprise Mobility Solutions

A possible bright spot – less commoditization, and a moat around the core business, but if the housing downturn affects municipality tax bases, then upgrades to police, fire and EMT services will be few and far between – meaning more mileage for the Crown Victoria fleets, and more hours on the existing Motorola scanners. RFID segments could be an opportunity. As the NFL season starts, we’ll be able to again see the ubiquitous Motorola logo on the coaches headsets on the sidelines, reinforced with the company name on the mic. A reassurance that there is, for the moment a pulse in Schaumberg.

Mobile Devices

As Apple and Research In Motion surf the tsunami of smartphone popularity, Motorola’s ship has sunk. Yes, the DynaTAC started the mobile phone revolution, yes, the StarTAC and RAZR were two of the most popular mobile devices of all time. But in Q4 of 2008, Motorola’s market share collapsed by 50%, now down to about 8.7% of the market. The halo around the iPhone and the Blackberry, the momentum of HTC, LG and Samsung will only serve to drive their share even lower in upcoming quarters. Even the Android OS is unlikely to help – cell phones, some 25 years into their lifespan are valued in the consumer market for the form of the device, function follows form. Further, most of the thought leadership that brought the RAZR to market has moved on, and with their market share decimated, Motorola will struggle to find the resources to innovate in R&D. And while Motorola has profited through divestiture of its divisions in the past, they will likely have to pay to unload the mobile unit.

Lastly, much has been made of Sanjay Jha’s compensation package as co-CEO – roughly $104 million, with 103.5 of that tied to equity, bonuses. I applaud the weighting of the compensation toward the success of the company, but imagine that having a co-CEO who is on a package at 25% of Jha’s will inevitably be a cause for turmoil.

With 32 teams in the NFL, you have to ask, just how many headsets would you need to sell to cover 125 million in CEO compensation?