Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!uwm.edu!bionet!agate!ucbvax!RICHTER.MIT.EDU!krowitz
From: krowitz@RICHTER.MIT.EDU (David Krowitz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apollo
Subject: re: 400t upgrade to 425t !!FLAME!!
Message-ID: <9103292014.AA08198@richter.mit.edu>
Date: 29 Mar 91 20:14:39 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
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The current HP educational discount is 38%. Sun's is 40% and DEC's special-
friends-of -Ken-Olsen's-working-at-MIT sometimes goes as high as 50%.

It's not a university problem. Some big customers (like say, Boeing, or
Mentor Graphics), get big discounts, too. It's a basic law of marketing.
Big customers get more attention than little ones. Try getting a Sun sales
person to come on site to sell you another 2 Sparcstations (even though
your department has bought about 40 so far, all in 2's and 3's). Fat
chance! Try getting your HP salesman to come on site to sell you 20
HP 9000 series 700 machines! (if I could make the offer, Mike Hutnyan,
our longtime loyal account rep would be here tomorrow). A sales man/woman
can't give as much attention to 10 $20K accounts as they can to 2
$100K accounts. The other problem is that money already paid is not
as important as money still to be received. As John has noted, HP has
a limitted number of '040 CPU boards (still!). They must either refuse
to book new orders for series 425t/425t machines (which causes them to
lose revenue in the current quarter), or they must ship the new orders
within 30 days and ship the upgrades when they can. Booking new orders
is always more important in the eyes of Wall St.

== Dave
   the cynical curmugeon