john@zygot.ati.com (John Higdon) (02/18/91)
AT&T NEWS BRIEFS
SOVIET SPIRIT -- AT&T said it signed its first telephone-equipment
distribution contract for the Soviet Union ... AT&T said it agreed to
allow the Moscow Local Telephone Network, a government agency known as
MGTS, to sell AT&T's Spirit Communications System product to business
customers and AT&T-approved equipment dealers - likely other Soviet
government organizations.
Well, isn't that special? At last AT&T has found a promising market
for its virtually featureless small telephone systems. What better
place to sell them than somewhere that the competition is either
non-existent or dreadful?
Someday AT&T may wake up and come to the party, but for now its
equipment offerings leave a lot to be desired. Even the mighty Systems
25, 75, and 85 have major inflexibilities that render them useless for
many potential applications. (No station CPC, inflexible station
numbering, inflexible hardware configurations, to name a few.) The
highly touted 5000 series cordless phones have those damned little
short DTMF bursts that make voice mail retrival next to impossible.
The Spirit is too weenie to even use in my residence, while the Merlin
is way too expensive (and still does not have some of the capabilities
that I require). The PARTNER is unknown, but given the information
posted so far and AT&T's past performance in this arena, initial
indications are that it is similarly lacking in features that people
really need and use.
Someone suggested to me recently that AT&T would do well to BUY a
Panasonic KX-T123212, set it up, see how it works, and then correct
its deficiencies and enhance its features. What a killer system that
would be! But as it is, I get e-mail from AT&T employees singing the
praises of the company's brain-dead offerings from a position of
obviously never even seeing the competitions' wares. I have said this
before and will say it again, when AT&T finally gets its head out of
the sand in the equipment market, it wiil become a force to be
reckoned with. The competition had better watch out; someday it may
happen.
John Higdon | P. O. Box 7648 | +1 408 723 1395
john@zygot.ati.com | San Jose, CA 95150 | M o o !dam@mtqua.att.com (02/22/91)
John Higdon wrote to the Digest to discuss a deal to sell AT&T phone systems in the USSR. He said: > Well, isn't that special? At last AT&T has found a promising market > for its virtually featureless small telephone systems. What better > place to sell them than somewhere that the competition is either > non-existent or dreadful? > Someday AT&T may wake up and come to the party, but for now its > equipment offerings leave a lot to be desired. Even the mighty Systems > 25, 75, and 85 have major inflexibilities that render them useless for > many potential applications. (No station CPC, inflexible station > numbering, inflexible hardware configurations, to name a few.) WRONG ON ALL THREE COUNTS! Systems 25, 75, and 85 all provide station CPC. The station numbering is completely flexible (0 for operator is fixed). The hardware configurations are extremely flexible (any card in any slot, cards may be inserted and administered while system is up) In fact the three systems use many of the same port cards. Where do you get your facts? The Panasonic brochure? > The Spirit is too weenie to even use in my residence, while the Merlin > is way too expensive (and still does not have some of the capabilities > that I require). I think the "capabilities" you require are simply that it says Panasonic on it. You show your lack of knowledge about the MERLIN product line by refering to it as MERLIN. Do you mean MERLIN II? Of course it's too expensive for you, but it's a pretty big system. It has a 120 station x 56 CO line capacity. Or do you mean MERLIN Plus? It is smaller and cheaper than MERLIN II, but still has quite a rich feature set. Or do you mean one of the old MERLIN systems that has been discontinued? It may not have the most modern features because it's an old product. You can't lump all of these into one generic "MERLIN." It does not make sense to talk about the capabilities or price of MERLIN without specifying which one. By the way, MERLIN, MERLIN PLUS, and SPIRIT are all market leaders, so they obviously fill the needs of a whole lot of customers. > The PARTNER is unknown, but given the information > posted so far and AT&T's past performance in this arena, initial > indications are that it is similarly lacking in features that people > really need and use. Don't judge PARTNER before you've seen it. It may not satisfy your needs, but your needs are hardly representative of the rest of the world. > Someone suggested to me recently that AT&T would do well to BUY a > Panasonic KX-T123212, set it up, see how it works, and then correct > its deficiencies and enhance its features. What a killer system that > would be! Believe me, AT&T knows the Panasonic line and feels quite confident that the AT&T line is superior. It certainly sells better. > But as it is, I get e-mail from AT&T employees singing the > praises of the company's brain-dead offerings from a position of > obviously never even seeing the competitions' wares. I have said this > before and will say it again, when AT&T finally gets its head out of > the sand in the equipment market, it wiil become a force to be > reckoned with. The competition had better watch out; someday it may > happen. Whose head is in the sand? You obviously don't know too much about MERLIN because you don't specify which MERLIN you are talking about. You don't know too much about Systems 25, 75, and 85, because you were incorrect in all three attributes you listed. I'm not sending you email, but that's because I don't see any point in discussing this with you. (I presume there is a close connection between Panasonic and your source of income). I would just like to point out your biases and misinformation to our fellow Digest readers. I am probably taking a risk in posting this article because I am an AT&T employee, but these views are my own. I want to point out that there is no proprietary information in this article, and that it does not point out any deficiencies in any AT&T or non-AT&T product. It is a rebuttal to an incorrect article. Dan Margolis