DRAPER -- The latest tremor to strike computer speech recognition company Fonix Corp. hit at midday Friday when Nasdaq announced a trading halt for Fonix stock.
The halt was announced at 10:44 a.m. with Nasdaq officials saying they were requesting information from the company. "Trading will remain halted until Fonix Corporation has fully satisfied Nasdaq's requests for additional information," Nasdaq said in a release."We've been in touch with Nasdaq," said Fonix technology vice president John Oberteuffer. "They didn't call us ahead of time but we called them immediately" after trading was halted.
Oberteuffer said he believes all of Nasdaq's questions are being answered or are already addressed in recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Nasdaq had questions about unusual trading volumes in recent days, but Oberteuffer wouldn't say specifically what other concerns market officials have.
Fonix was told Nasdaq officials would look at the company's responses over the weekend but Oberteuffer said he was not given any indication whether Fonix would be trading when the markets open Monday.
The per-share trade price just before the halt was $1. Fonix stock traded as high as $6 in May.
Investors recently reacted positively to a deal Fonix announced with Lucent Technologies Inc. in February. Lucent plans to use Fonix's handwriting recognition software. Fonix also got a positive investor response at the end of January to founder Stephen M. Studdert's cost-cutting plan and simultaneous resignation as chief executive officer. Studdert remains as the board chairman.
That top-level change came two months after the company's single largest investor, WordPerfect founder Alan Ashton, resigned from the board, citing the need to pursue other interests.
Fonix's biggest commercial successes have been with computer speech recognition and handwriting products it acquired from other companies. Fonix's own core technologies have languished in development.
Co-founder and new CEO Thomas Murdock said in January the company would have significant news about its own technology within 60 days.