bill@carpet.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) (04/17/89)
In article <99264@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> plocher%sally@Sun.COM (John Plocher) writes: >From article <196@carpet.WLK.COM>, by bill@carpet.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy): [ John's agreeing he doesn't have time to be the champion, then spelling out what release level AT&T/Intel has for the '286 ] >> AT&T's Simul-Task was the most stable and seamless DOS under UNIX ... >> I'd be delighted if I could run PC 6300 PLUS UNIX on my AT clone. > >But the 6300+ has SPECIAL hardware to support DosMerge - The AT doesn't >have it. I don't think it was specifically for Simul-Task, but I'll concede that they did remap memory using hardware and that made the job a lot easier. The PLUS never attempted or pretended to be AT compatible, the hardware design preceded the AT, but that's not what I'm following up. I appreciate John's comments and I would have emailed, but I think that my questions are pertinent and of wider interest than an email discussion. >ASSUME a total of 10,000 owners of V/286. ASSUME 30% are interested. > > Year 1 > 3,000 people * $50 = $150,000 > > $150,000 Working funds > minus > $ 80,000 AT&T Source License for ONE CPU > $ 20,000 AT&T Source License for a SECOND CPU Those certainly are going rate figures, but would they necessarily apply to a non-product, i.e. one that they are neither interested in nor promoting? I realize that their interest level could certainly change if they thought that someone else was interested. Maybe they could even become interested in a "partial source" license, i.e. leave the kernel alone, binary license that for distribution, and do utilities like they do the other options. I'm asking because I don't know. Strictly from my point of view, I feel a lot less territorial about my proprietary 8080 code than I did ten years ago. > $ 20,000 Computers for the above license > (4-8Mb mem, 350Mb, VGA...) That seems high and I think that not only careful shopping, but also some kind of realistic contribution would bring it down. > $ 5,000 Legal Fees for incorporation and > Insurance > $ 10,000 Production and shipping costs (low) $30 a whack for diskettes? Maybe so if it was something other than just diskettes. > $450,000 AT&T Royalties at $150/copy > Remember, The current license is > only valid between Microport and > You. Not Easter Computer and You. OK, using the reverse arithmetic. I suspect that $150/copy is right for Vr3.2, but for Vr2.5? If that was so and $30 for production and shipping, then how was Microport surviving at $199 for (retail) V/AT with dealer and OEM terms? A $19/copy margin isn't very healthy. > -------- > ($435,000) Salary :-( Could very well be, I was proposing some very loose figures for a reality check. John has been a lot closer to this than the rest of us put together. I'll accept the numbers without discussion if we were talking about a '386 Vr3 effort, but '286 Vr2? What were the real numbers for V/AT? I'll guess or speculate that Microport's money woes started with the '386 effort and that they were moderately healthy in the '286 world. I'm also aware that AT&T changed a lot of the rules when they found out that they could make money selling UNIX, but did they change across the board? All versions and platforms? If so, I'll shut up, I don't know, that's why I'm asking. >> owners who aren't on the net (could we buy Microport's mailing list?). > > Call Jim Brain at (408) 441-0140 and ask him. I will, thanks for the contact info. Maybe the first step is to see what needs to be done to find out if anything can be done. >I hate to be a pail of cold water, but you really need to figure out the >costs, determine the number of customers, and THEN set a price. Not the >other way around. Perhaps in textbook market surveys and writing business plans, but if you have insufficient resources to acquire any kind of market share at all, then you don't even set out on the undertaking. If, for example, fewer than 100 people respond to the original query, I'll suggest that there is not sufficient support to proceed. That would indicate to me that by my first metric (1 response = 3 potentials) we've fewer than 10% of John's gloomy (but maybe realistic) example. Not trying to end run Jim Brain, but does anyone have any idea how many V/AT licenseees have access to usenet? Any notions from BBS usage or anything like that? I'm curious because it would give us some idea of whether or not sufficient souls exist to pursue this. I know that some like Rick Richardson have just given up, I sympathize, I did the same thing on V/386. We still might be able to harvest Rick (nothing personal here, his article was in the same batch with John's) and other like him for some other purpose, e.g. they have something they'd like to sell to a '286 platform. In round numbers I wonder how many are out there. Thanks to John for giving us the first authoritative figures to look at. Thus far, all we've had is wondering and speculation (mostly over my .signature). -- Bill Kennedy Internet: bill@ssbn.WLK.COM Usenet: {texbell,att,killer,sun!daver,cs.utexas.edu}!ssbn!bill
plocher%sally@Sun.COM (John Plocher) (04/17/89)
In article <197@carpet.WLK.COM> bill@ssbn.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) writes: >> $ 10,000 Production and shipping costs (low) >$30 a whack for diskettes? Maybe so if it was something other than just >diskettes. I was assuming Docs, but then I forgot to factor them in to the license costs: $ 20,000 Documentation Reproduction License $10~$50 per copy for royalty >then how was Microport surviving at $199 for (retail) V/AT Well, as Chuck once said "We'll make it up in volume" :-) >Bill Kennedy -John Plocher
ron@fct.UUCP (Ronald P. Hughes) (04/18/89)
In article <197@carpet.WLK.COM>, bill@carpet.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) writes: > ... $30 for production and shipping, then how was Microport > surviving at $199 for (retail) V/AT with dealer and OEM terms? > A $19/copy margin isn't very healthy. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ You could be on to something here. Keep in mind Microport's current status. I worked for Microport for almost a year. There was a little saying that upper management was fond of repeating: Each one we sell, we sell at a loss, but we make up for it in volume. I left when I realized that there was more truth than humor in the above. I also recall some theories about "buying market share", which I was not quite able to comprehend. My personal opinion is that UNIX will never be available for as low a price as Microport's. If you find one that cheap and you decide to buy it, I would not recommend their lifetime support contract. Their life may not be as long as yours. ;-) On the other hand, if you're thinking of embarking on such a venture yourselves, you need to either ship much higher volume than Microport, or charge a significantly higher price. (Or just cut back on the quality :-) Good luck! Ronald P. Hughes Fall Creek Technologies ron@fct.uu.net