@Setanta,
A typically long and windy response that says little, and has more to do with yourself than the subject to which your remarks were presumably addressed.
The question is how long a company can survive if all or a large majority of its revenue stream is cut off, and the productivity of what remains is significantly reduced by the ongoing constraints. A related issue is the extent to which a company can afford to retain its employees in such a situation.
I'm on the Boards of three corporations; one publicly traded; one a privately held S corp. and the third,and my own, which is an employee owned ESOP corporation. Revenues range from $3oo to $500 million/year. All three are consulting engineering & construction companies. My own is an environmental consulting and remediation company. Each does from 40% to 50% of it's work on fixed price, at risk, construction and remediation projects for mostly large private sector firms, the Federal government and various State & Local government agencies.
So far most of the private sector projects in all three companies are on hold, and the revenue streams winding down. New starts are rare. Federal environmental projects are continuing, though the complexity of getting reliable subcontractors, laboratory services, etc. has grown significantly. We now have most of our employees working at home. Field work on construction & remediation projects is becoming more difficult every day with issues ranging from local conditions and how to get the job done while maintaining 2 yds. separation adding new cost and complexity every day. We have excellent computer networks & software, but are already seeing lowered productivity on our consulting work, though we hope to mitigate that as we learn.
Basically ~ 20% of our revenue streams have stopped cold, putting all three companies in a loss position on ongoing operations. More cutoffs are expected as we continue. We expect to be able to sustain this without layoffs for a few months. However the operational obstacles are expected to grow as we continue the current constraints.
We can survive as long as our current assets & cash flow permit, though staff reductions become increasingly likely- something we don't want to do.
Overall we are fortunate in that the current environment permits the majority of our work to continue, though with a steady drain on current assets. Think of the industries that are even more affected from entertainment, to restaurants, retail sales, etc. All face far immediate losses of much larger fractions of revenue and all of the costs & complexities note above.
