Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!hplabs!hp-pcd!hplsla!tomb
From: tomb@hplsla.HP.COM (Tom Bruhns)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Autocad (was OS/2 vs AmigaDOS)
Message-ID: <5160038@hplsla.HP.COM>
Date: 25 May 89 18:15:34 GMT
References: <15588@swrinde.nde.swri.edu>
Organization: HP Lake Stevens, WA
Lines: 80

dave@dms3b1.UUCP (Dave Hanna) writes:
>In article <5160034@hplsla.HP.COM> tomb@hplsla.HP.COM (Tom Bruhns) writes:
>>                    Amigas have not found their place in business
>>applications.  What is the incentive for AutoCad to be ported to
>>Amy?  How many people would buy it, even at 1/2 the PC-edition
>>price?  I'd guess maybe a few dozen.  If I were the manager responsible
>>for making the decision to port it to Amy or not, and I were graded
>                                                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>on profitability, I'd run from it, screaming!  
>^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> 
> Okay, possibly dumb idea here, but what if some of us whiz-bang program-
>ming types were to approach the product managers at some of these companies,
>(and I'm not just talking AutoCAD, but all the business areas that we don't
>have adequate representation.) with a proposal that they license their
>source code to us, we port to the Amiga, give it back to them to sell,
>we get a percentage of Amiga sales. For the product manager, it's a no-lose
>situation.  Bingo, increase market penetration, zero upfront expenditure, 
>all pure profit .  Of course, we who believe in the Amiga and would be 
>doing the work would be substantially at risk, but, hey, that's what 
>free-enterprise is about.
>
>Any guesses as to what kind of a reaction we might get with such an approach?
>
>Other variants: license the code to us, we'll port it, AND sell it, AND
>support it, and pay them a (small) percentage of sales.  That get's around
>the objection that "We still have to train our people to sell it and support
>it".
>
>>Tom Bruhns
>
>   Dave Hanna
>-- 
>Dave Hanna,  Infotouch Systems, Inc. |  "Do or do not -- There is no try"
>P.O. Box 584, Bedford, TX 76095      |                        - Yoda
>(214) 358-4534   (817) 540-1524      |
>UUCP:  ...!killer!gtmvax!dave        |
>----------

Dave -- and others -- I think you have a good idea here.  But be aware
that the marketing costs can indeed be a very significant portion of the
total costs.  And a lot of what makes a professional program great, IMHO,
is the support: making sure the bugs get fixed, making sure the customers
get the fixes, making sure the customers are aware of the latest-greatest,
and the list goes on and on.  I recall before Excellence! was released, I
was given the opportunity to buy it from MSS for a really good price because
I was a Scribble! owner.  I wouldn't touch it because MSS had just
essentially spat in my face when I wrote a direct but non-flaming letter
complaining about the problems I was having with Scribble!, which included
_loosing_data_ -- an unpardonable sin in my eyes.  WordPerfect, on the
other hand, has my full respect for their support of their product.  But
it costs them a lot to do that.

Now what if you take on the support of, let's say, AmigaGenericCad.  How
will you be able to support not only your port but all the additional
things that PCGenericCad is doing?  Do you give the customer two phone
numbers, one for GenericGenericCad issues and one for AmigaSpecificGen-
ericCad issues?  Or do you try to do it all yourself?

I really think it's a nice idea, but I do think you will have lots of
work ahead of you to pull it off smoothly.  And if I owned the rights
to the base program, I would want some assurances you had both the
plan and ability to do it, because I wouldn't want my product screwed
up by someone I had little control over...

I guess the bottom line is, why don't you pick a product to try this
with and put together a proposal to actually do it?  Make sure the
proposal is a good one, because if the parent organization thinks it
has little enough merit, you will probably be invited to not come back.

There's something else to be considered:  how many of the professionally-
accepted programs on PCs or maybe even Macs would you be able to port
into the Amiga and have them really look like Amiga programs while also
retaining all the best of the originals?  It seems to me WP suffered from
this quite a bit;  although I like WP on the Amiga, I know a lot of folk
that do NOT.  And I would agree that it isn't amiga-ized very heavily.

Cheers,
Tom Bruhns
tomb%hplsla@hplabs.hp.com