Conference 7.286::digital

    Thinking about the Fortune XXX may not get you all of Digital's large
    customers.  For example, Pioneer and Avent are VERY large distributors
    of Digital products (very large = >$50m/year).  In the market I know
    (healthcare), Digital's top 3 CSOs probably generate more than $100m
    per year.  Both the distributors and CSO represent the kind of "yields"
    I believe the Company wants, FYI.

	No doubt that information is confidential. As if the competition
	couldn't find out! The only effect is to blindfold Digital
	employees who may not realize that the guy who just rang with
	an awkward request at 5 o'clock on Friday represents Digital's
	third biggest customer...

	Where I sit, it sometimes seems that the names of account
	managers are confidential. A few years ago, in a sporadic and
	not-to-be-repeated attempt to work more efficiently, I tracked
	down a "Strategic Accounts Group" in Digital UK, and had the
	temerity to write and request a list of the accounts and the
	associated account teams. In reply I received a sharp note
	suggsting that if my manager's manager were to request the
	list, he might be allowed a copy provided it were to be kept
	under lock and key.

	Otherwise, no doubt, they might have run the risk of being
	pestered by people wanting to buy stuff.

	/Tom

	As you Tom I really do not understand this politic of secret. 
	I bring two more stories to illustrate:

	Recently a friend of mine working in a small software company 
	had to do a study for a large customer including a hardware
	configuration. He told me that he will go for a VAX and many
	PCs from Compac. Of course I draw his attention on the fact that we
	were also competitive on PCs, so he asked his Digital salesman
	who, of course, was more than pleased to show that we can do a good
	offer.

	Two days later he realised that to study the different hardware 
	combinations he needed a complete price-list, so he phoned his DEC
	salesman who was in vacation. Guess what? He had to wait the man's 
	return to get the *confidential* list of price. By chance this guy
	still has the good old DEC's technical expertise in mind otherwise
	Compac would have one new client.

	Less recently another friend of mine in another software house (yes, 
	I maintain my network, just in case) asked me for a list of Digital's
	clients for a mailing to sell their expertise on our systems. I told
	him to follow the official way. He answered: I already tried without
	success!
	
	It seems that we have not recovered from the days customers were
	queueing for our machines. A question comes to mind "Is somebody
	managing this confidentiality?" or "is it a sort of self-censorship
	that nobody knows why it is going on?"
 
	Jo�l  

    A "friend" asking you for a list of Digital's clients is no friend at
    all.  Please do not give out this information, if you have access to
    it.
    
    Mark

	  Mark,

	Are you serious? My friends can ask me any question they want. In
	fact anybody can ask me any question. In French we say "there is
	no indescreet question there are only indiscreet answers." You can
	count on me to manage the discretion of my answer in this case and
	in others.

	Instead of giving me a lesson of professional behaviour can you
	answer why our list of clients is secret for a partner who want
	to sell his/her solution on OUR machine? Business is always based
	on confidence and as Tom said all our competitors know our list of
	clients as we know theirs (at least I hope we are enough market and
	customer driven that we know who is buying from who and possibly why).

	  Jo�l	  

    Well, there's "lead generation", just for starters.  We would lose the
    ability to approach a customer and say, "Hey, our new Storage product
    will go REAL GOOD with that 3rd party software you just bought."
    
    Then there's cooperative marketing campaigns, like featuring 3rd party
    software products in our catalogs (which go to all our customers).
    
    Does your friend's company have a real relationship with Digital?  If
    not, I'd like to help establish one.  Give me a call or send me some
    mail and let me know about them.
    
    Mark
    Independent Software Vendors Group
    297-3524
            

 
       This has been an interesting discussion ! I know a couple of people
    who work for/with companies that write software on Digital platforms.
    One of them is based outside the US. And they know more about Digital
    products and Digital customers than I can ever hope to know. In fact,
    whenever I have met them, they have given me information which I
    wouldn't have received otherwise. They work with Digital customers of
    all sizes to write specialized applications for them.

      Mark, is it a good idea for Digital to have a formal relationship 
    with them ? I can try and get them to contact you, although I am sure
    that they must have tried to do that to begin with.

      Re. the base note about the large Digital customers: I still don't
    see why that would be a secret ...  CNN/NBR/local-media  have 
    talked about the $27M order from Goodyear tires recently; the $125M 
    contract with Hughes aircraft and so on. I would think that Digital
    would use these large customer names to get other large customers.
    And they have done exactly that in the "Digital has it now" ad-
    campaign.

     Nitin.                                                        
    

    when i worked for EDS at the GM account before becoming a DECeee, we
    were a big customer to DEC, iam sure EDS is still is, at GM plants
    VAXes we very important link in the overall plant operation, most of
    the plants architectures sort of looked like this, computer wise:

                        IBM main frame  <----- vehicle data, orders etc..
                              + ^
                              | |
                              V |
                             Vax'es
                              + ^
                              | |
                              v |
          Cell controllers (mostly HP), Numerical controllers, etc..
                              + ^             
                              | |
                              v |
               Robot controllers, Automated Guided Vehicles
                                            (AGV's etc..)

    dont know how big money wise all of this was, but VAX'es were used
    heavily in EDS/GM accounts, DEC workstations also for CAD work etc..

    also when working on Boeing account, there was some VAX'es, there
    was a big DEC project 'SMARTS' in seattle where DEC equipment  were 
    involved, but Boeing is mostly IBM shop. GM uses more DEC hardware
    (lots of PDP's too!) than Boeing i think.
    
    \bye
    \nasser

                  

    I'm sure that the press releases that you are referring to were agreed
    upon by both Digital and the customer.
    
    Please send me the names and addresses of the software vendors.  I'll
    try to have someone from their country contact them (if they aren't
    already).
    
    Mark

    re: .0, for a different outlook on your request:
    
    Some large customers, like the one I support, wish to have their
    name and application kept confidential so their competitors do not
    learn anything through the vendor.  In fact, there is a current
    legal non-disclosure between Digital and this company.  As part of 
    the team, I'm the "messenger" of this agreement to all in DEC.
    
    I have gotten reamed by senior customer management more often than
    I care to mention when someone in Digital sent mail about my
    customer's application internally, that mail got sent/forwarded and
    someone in the chain gave it to their customer, who then called 
    a friend back at my customer saying "DEC told me you're......" and 
    in fact, has faxxed a copy of the DEC mail to prove it.  Never
    mind the legal implications, clearly confidentiality didn't happen.
    Consequently the team here won't support anything publicizing the
    customer's use of DEC product as we don't know how/where the info
    will be used.  
    
    Know I'm going on and on, but we'd rather be safe than sorry.
     
                                                    

    Another interesting perspective:
    
    	If most of our business comes from the Fortune 500, then
    we are in a world of hurt.
    
    	FORTUNE magazine observed that several years ago, the net
    profit of the entire 500 was ~$15 billion.  THIS YEAR, the TOTAL
    NET profit of the 500 is ~$10 million.  A lot is due to accounting
    changes, but still!!!  (I am doing the numbers from memory, but yes,
    the three orders of magnitude reduction is correct)
    

    Not a terribly relevant comparison, as you eluded to.
    This recent change in the accounting of retirees medical benefits has
    caused massive "paper" losses (witness Chrysler's $400m loss last
    week, really a gain if that was taken out).  The majority of these
    writeoffs have occured at some point over the last year (DEC, IBM,
    etc).  Since Fortune 500 companies tend to be the older established
    companies, this accounting change has had a huge impact on posted
    profits.