Engine said in an SEC Filing this week that TaxAct and Avantax “are not fulfilling their potential.”

The effort appears to differ from the one conducted by Ancora Holdings in last year’s challenge to the company’s board nominees. Ancora wanted to sell TaxAct, claiming it had no relationship to the wealth management busiess.

Engine, which said the current stock low was below the level during the Ancora challenge, said poor performance stemmed from the board’s lack of experience in key areas.

 It labeled the board’s experience insufficient in the following:                                                                                                                                                                       *“Wealth management experience and a lack of understanding of the needs of the average Avantax financial professional”;                                                                *Consumer finance;                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         *Mergers and acquisitions.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          * Turnaround, transformation and value creation; and                                                                                                                                                                                       * Lacked “shareholder input and ownership perspectives”.

Engine revealed it privately nominated a four-person slate that include one of its principal. It said it hoped the private approach would lend itself to a more amicable resolution and a public debate.

“Blucora accused us of providing an inaccurate response to one question on its onerous 66-page director candidate questionnaire and consequently moved to unilaterally invalidate our nomination of an Engine principal,” Engine said it proxy filing.

Engine said it did not let its candidates be interviewed by the Board Nominating and Governance Committee. “The Board has already tipped its hand by questioning the validity of our nominations based on frivolous technicalities, leading us to not view interview requests as sincere,” the firm continued.

Bob Scott

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Bob Scott has provided information to the tax and accounting community since 1991, first as technology editor of Accounting Today, and from 1997 through 2009 as editor of its sister publication, Accounting Technology. He is known throughout the industry for his depth of knowledge and for his high journalistic standards.  Scott has made frequent appearances as a speaker, moderator and panelist and events serving tax and accounting professionals. He  has a strong background in computer journalism as an editor with two former trade publications, Computer+Software News and MIS Week and spent several years with weekly and daily newspapers in Morris County New Jersey prior to that.  A graduate of Indiana University with a degree in journalism, Bob is a native of Madison, Ind