Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!wuarchive!uunet!nih-csl!helix.nih.gov
From: bert@helix.nih.gov (Bert Tyler)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: RE: OS/2 sales forecasts
Message-ID: <1466@nih-csl.nih.gov>
Date: 9 May 91 21:59:26 GMT
Sender: news@nih-csl.nih.gov
Organization: National Institutes of Health, Bethesda
Lines: 40

> BTW:  to those who keep insisting that OS/2 has a "miniscule" following
> (that word is a direct quote from someone.  Yeah, you know who you are),
> think again.  Just because IBM doesn't wear its sales figures on its
> sleeve like some sort of badge ("Hey mon, look whoat I deed" - said with
> your best Jamaican accent. ;), doesn't mean that OS/2 is doing poorly.

IBM has loosened up a little bit in talking about sales figures in
this case.  A friend of mine who manages a PC group for one of IBM's
large accounts just received from his IBM rep a copy of a handout that
IBM apparantly gave out during their April 15th meetings.  The handout
is titled "IBM Briefings Outline OS/2 Strategies and Directions April 15,
1991".  On the third page, in a section titled "Customer Support of OS/2"
is the following bullet:

"Today there are approximately 600,000 OS/2 copies installed worldwide
and IBM believes that by the end of 1991 there will be more than one
million OS/2 copies installed worldwide."

I'm assuming that the marketing folks that distributed that memo included
the copies of OS/2 used internally by IBM in that figure - I would have.
The memo does say "installed" rather than "sold", and it is in IBM's
interest to quote the largest figure possible.  For reference, independent
research agencies like the Gartner Group all seem to be quoting total
installed base figures of more like 300,000 for OS/2.

At any rate, IBM is estimating future sales of OS/2 at 400,000 copies
over the next eight months.  As a comparison, Microsoft's Brad Silverberg
has stated that Microsoft sold 2.75 million copies of Windows 3.0 during
its first nine months (2.25 million sold through retail channels, 0.5
million sold to OEMs and bundled with their systems).

Yes, the general feeling is that OS/2 has, to date, sold exceptionally
poorly.  OS/2 2.0 has the potential to reverse this trend - when it is
released in seven months or so.  As a certified member of cynics anonymous,
I feel obliged to point out that this is exactly what a lot of folks were
saying OS/2 1.3 would do last fall, and it certainly hasn't done so.

Bert Tyler
tub@cu.nih.gov
bert@helix.nih.gov