My name is Prabhat Jain. I am posting this blog in response to an anonymous blog posted by 3 blackmailers and failed individuals. But first I want to share with you the story of my life of hard work and innovation, and the huge sacrifices I have made in order to help consumers enjoy great products and services globally.
Throughout my life which has been mostly spent in the Silicon Valley, Europe and India, I have been lucky enough to meet and work with incredibly smart and driven people who “never gave up”, who challenged themselves to climb the tallest mountains. Such as Nolan Bushnell or Al Alcorn (Atari), Steve Jobs or Steve Wozniak (Apple), Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer (Microsoft), Wilf Corrigan or Charlie Sporck (Fairchild), Andy Grove (Intel) or Scott McNealy (Sun) , Vinod Khosla (Khosla Ventures) or Tony Perkins (Kleiner Perkins).
I studied at Stephen’s College in Delhi (Physics), University of Vienna (Schwachstrom) and University of California, Berkeley with graduate and post graduate degrees in BioElectronics. I speak multiple languages. I have influential friends all over the world from academia, the tennis world (including ex –ranked Wimbledon players), CEOs of large technology companies, venture firms and family.
Over the years, I have formed some well known companies such as the first subassembly manufacturing plant (Solectron) in the Silicon Valley, pioneered delivery of color into Apple computers and developed VGA semiconductors (Video-7), first 16 bit audio and cd rom chips and systems (Media Vision), high quality audio software and boards (Turtle Beach), full motion video circuits (Dazzle), compression codecs for the mobile industry (Emuzed) and place shifting products (Monsoon Multimedia). All of these companies were highly successful. Solectron and Media Vision (2 companies I founded) topped the world’s top 100 companies in 1992.
AL THESE ACCOMPLISHMENTS REQUIRED VERY HARD WORK, POUNDING THE STREETS, LOYALTIES AND COMITTMENTS. AND ALONG THE WAY, DUE TO THE RISKS ONE TAKES, MISTAKES WERE ALSO MADE. IT’S A PART OF THE JOURNEY.
Over the last 4 years I have been harassed by three ex-employees and directors of one of the companies I founded. These 3: Graham Radstone, Arvind Jha and Divesh Nath are mean spirited and want to prove that I am a “bad guy”. Innovators are easy prey for manipulative “professionals” such as these three.
There are no facts to substantiate any of their allegations that they have made in their most recent blackmail blog. Media Vision, a company that existed 23 years ago and whose demise was based on a complicated set of factors does not constitute who I am or what I do today. Regarding using shareholder funds, I was the largest investor in Monsoon Multimedia with over $5mi invested and did not take any salary for 5 years. On the other hand, Monsoon paid Radstone over $2mi in salary and expenses and Jha over $500,000. Their unsigned blog is blackmail and character assassination and is the lowest form of demagoguery, pure and simple.
There are 3 reasons why these three are on a smear campaign against me. First, they are jealous and upset that I am succeeding with new ventures. Despite their sustained gutter level efforts in destroying me in the misguided notion that the world should know about “Paul Jain”, I am still standing with my head held high and innovating; while they have reduced themselves to being blackmailers and irrelevancy. The second is that by being aggressive they want to hide the damage they have caused my shareholders. Potentially, they could be liable for significant damages and criminal prosecution. A third reason is that Radstone and Jha could have bought shares in the new companies that some of the previous shareholders of Monsoon have formed but they did not and therefore, “why not destroy these new companies”?
In contrast to this blog under my name, they are afraid to sign their names to their blog and have deleted all comments that I have posted on their blog in response. In fact they have blocked all comments that you or anyone might want to post. This is clear evidence that they are the ones who wrote the blackmail blog.
Here is the real story about what my team accomplished at Media Vision. It developed incredible audio semiconductors, audio-video subsystems, retail and OEM products for the global market and highly innovative software. Formed in 1991, it raised though 3 public offerings over $250mi in 1992-3. Its market cap hit $1bi in 1993, similar to a company today whose valuation might be $10 bi. It was one of the top 100 most successful companies globally. Unfortunately, in the last quarter, some senior executives inflated revenues by 8% and a low level journalist (starting his career) wrote a damaging article. Constituents such as class action and young government lawyers that want to prosecute at any cost took over. Small unintentional mistakes were labeled by Government lawyers as “evil and fraudulent misrepresentations” by the executives. Then there were the short sellers who were devastating. The loss to shareholders was of course greatly exaggerated to suit the media, lawyers and the government.
More than anything else, these kinds of people sank Media Vision. I had no role in revenue inflation. I am a technologist and a marketer. In fact, I was forced to admit certain events, that according to my lawyer if I did not admit, I would not be offered a deal. So I paid a penalty and spent some time in a white collar camp. But I held my head high, did not run away from the punishment but came back and started new innovative companies.
Monsoon Multimedia‘s (another company I had co-founded) CEO and Chairman was Graham Radstone, “ably assisted” by Arvind Jha, its President of Monsoon India. The Private Equity Team of Merrill Lynch in Hong Kong wanted to make a substantial investment in Monsoon based on my recommendation. Radstone was put in charge of completing the deal. He bungled this up quite badly taking 3 months longer than the deadline. To really top it off, he did not negotiate out a significant clause that left in a bridge financing note without conversion to equity.
Graham was finally asked to leave for wire transferring $100k into his own account while he was CEO of Monsoon Multimedia. Moreover, he failed to disclose details of bank accounts owned by the Company that the Company auditors wanted disclosed. He subsequently ran away to the UK, leaving the India operation in shambles, the USA operation with a huge debt and the Singapore Company with large creditors. Hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxes were left unpaid. I tried very hard to contain the damage. For a while it looked as if we were on our way to success. But Radstone and Jha killed the operation by sending a stream of damaging emails to shareholders who might otherwise have supported the company by more investments. Moreover Merrill partners (now at a new firm) in a conspiracy with Radstone and Jha used the clause that he and Merrill left in the investment documents to sink Monsoon’s parent, Winfort, in Singapore in the hope of grabbing Monsoon’s assets. Moreover, this fellow Radstone was entrusted to be my trustee. He has misused this position and continues to. I have not reported him so far to the UK law authorities.
Arvind Jha was hired by Radstone in late 2000. Jha was obstinate and an impossible executive. He created significant problems with Monsoon executives in the USA and Russia. Later, after he was fired by the company, he went on a brutal campaign to discredit me and in collusion with Graham sought to damage, defame and destroy my innovations-apparently all in the name of transparency from the fallout at Media Vision, 23 years ago! Jha is a failed businessman and human being. He has no success to his name. He has used the real estate that his wife has accumulated to survive. He is a blackmailer posting blogs without signing his name on to them.
Divesh Nath is also a failed, petty businessman. He has stolen from his grandfather substantial sums of money, stamp collections and photos of several generations of family members. He survives by forging documents, wills and getting loans from banks on hypothetical assets to finance expensive trips to Europe every year. He drives in fancy cars and buys art collections from borrowings. He and his brother and mother have staked out in apartments owned by his uncles, refusing to leave till they are paid significant sums of money.
The bottom line is this: these are small time jealous and ugly people with time on their hands and hate in their hearts doing character assassination. Any new venture I start or help start such as Clypcall, a beautiful company with dedicated young employees developing world class technologies, they want to destroy. It is quite easy to blackmail, write fabrications and defame innovators such as myself on the web. At the end of the day, these 3 cannot put their names on their blogs. I can. That speaks volumes of my integrity in contrast to these failed thugs.
