Investor ROI
Old-School Quarterly Dividends
In a turbulent, chaotic economic environment, even as a tech startup, Beam 4K Inc. believes that the traditional IPO route to reward our investors is far too risky both for us and for investors. (Every investment, of course, involves some risk). We are choosing to go “old school” through dividends. There are penalties for dividends paid any more frequently than every 120 days, so ours will be quarterly dividends.
But we do dividends differently.
You may or may noy know that we do pricing differently, and many electronics brands have told us that we do it wrong. They tell us that we should set a target price and establish fixed budgets for things like marketing, payroll, overhead or the distribution channels. We can’t help but notice that, historically, such advice tended to come from companies that were failing to grow (or worse).
Our approach to pricing starts with the product’s total build cost. We devote an equal amount to an allowance for marketing, an equal amount to EBT (Earnings Before Taxes), and three times the cost-to-build to a margin allowance to cover sales and distribution channels and related expenses. Anything in the marketing and distribution allowances that we don’t spend (less a set-aside for unanticipated opportunities) adds to the EBT fund.
The EBT becomes an EAT (earnings after taxes) once taxes are paid. For rough budgetary purposes, we can stipulate a 30% tax rate. Our carve-out for investor ROI is 20% of the EAT.
Let’s put some numbers to it – with a bit of rounding to simplify the math.
- Our announced list pricing for the Beam4K™ Pro 24 is $20,000. Assume a build cost of $3,300.
- That makes the EBT also $3,300 per unit sold and our EAT $2310.
- The 20% carve-out is then $462 per unit. (Note that this leaves $1,848 per unit sold to fund payroll, overhead and other business costs – some of which will reduce the net tax rate – leaving that to the CPAs).
- With 2600 total shares, that’s roughly 18 cents per share for each unit sold.
UNITS | EBT/unit | EAT/unit | Inv. ROI | U/yr If monthly | EBT/yr. | EAT/yr. | Inv ROI/yr | Inv ROI/Q |
1 | $3,300 | $2,310 | $0.18 | 12 | $39,600 | $27,720 | $2.13 | $0.53 |
5 | $16,500 | $11,550 | $0.89 | 60 | $198,000 | $138,600 | $10.66 | $2.67 |
10 | $33,000 | $23,100 | $1.78 | 120 | $396,000 | $277,200 | $21.32 | $5.33 |
100 | $330,000 | $231,000 | $17.77 | 1200 | $3,960,000 | $2,772,000 | $213.23 | $53.31 |
500 | $1,650,000 | $1,155,000 | $88.85 | 6000 | $19,800,000 | $13,860,000 | $1,066.15 | $266.54 |
1000 | $3,300,000 | $2,310,000 | $177.69 | 12000 | $39,600,000 | $27,720,000 | $2,132.31 | $533.08 |
2000 | $6,600,000 | $4,620,000 | $355.38 | 24000 | $79,200,000 | $55,440,000 | $4,264.62 | $1,066.15 |
2345 | $7,738,500 | $5,416,950 | $416.69 | 28140 | $92,862,000 | $65,003,400 | $5,000.26 | $1,250.07 |
2400 | $7,920,000 | $5,544,000 | $426.46 | 28800 | $95,040,000 | $66,528,000 | $5,117.54 | $1,279.38 |
2500 | $8,250,000 | $5,775,000 | $444.23 | 30000 | $99,000,000 | $69,300,000 | $5,330.77 | $1,332.69 |
3000 | $9,900,000 | $6,930,000 | $533.08 | 36000 | $118,800,000 | $83,160,000 | $6,396.92 | $1,599.23 |
3518 | $11,609,400 | $8,126,580 | $625.12 | 42216 | $139,312,800 | $97,518,960 | $7,501.46 | $1,875.36 |
5000 | $16,500,000 | $11,550,000 | $888.46 | 60000 | $198,000,000 | $138,600,000 | $10,661.54 | $2,665.38 |
10000 | $33,000,000 | $23,100,000 | $1,776.92 | 120000 | $396,000,000 | $277,200,000 | $21,323.08 | $5,330.77 |
On the left, allocations per unit sold – on the right, extending those to monthly sales
Where do returns begin? During our pre-shipping LEAP (Leading Edge Advance Purchase) program period, if we get an average of 10 prepaid (at half price) orders per month during 3Q2025, investors will see a dividend payment for the calendar quarter of $2.67 per share. In the fourth quarter, as we ship and collect on PO-backed firm orders (at 70% of full price), the quarterly dividend might be around $250 or so. But are investors only after returns for the first 6 months? We regard that as more of an IPO mindset.
We hope – and believe – that the average for 2026 will be closer to 2500 units per month, and that 2026 dividends will exceed the share’s original purchase price – and continue to grow such that two years out, most investors might, if luck is with us all, have seen see a total return of triple their initial investment. (We can’t promise that, and we can’t guarantee that, but we can point out that, in each case, the marketing allowance is equal to our EBT).
This illustrative exercise is not to present any specific outcome as embedded in purchasing shares of Beam 4K, Inc. We are presenting it to illustrate why we believe that paying dividends based on a predetermined carve-out from after-tax profits is a sane approach to providing shareholder value. We might also spotlight each accompanying earnings level, since the value of each share is based on the valuation of the company and that no investor needs to ever surrender shares to collect dividends.