Conference 7.286::digital

Nice picture of Charlie Christ sitting in the middle of the latest and greatest
stuff with the quote: "we were in networking when Moby Dick was a minnow".

Don't know what they pay that guy but he's worth every dollar and then some.

- paul

I am glad to see some comments on this.  I could not believe the favorable 
pitch on the article.  Kept looking for the BUT and did not see it.  

The Glob has seemed to have a hate relationship with Digital or maybe the
previous management but to the same effect.  

Don't know if it will help but it certainly wont hurt.

I have noticed many positive articles in the Globe on Digital since we started
advertising with them saveral months back. I may be off the mark here but the
trend certainly has correlation, IMHO.

Avinash

>The Glob has seemed to have a hate relationship with Digital or maybe the
>previous management but to the same effect.  

	I'm not sure if the Boston Blobe is a ~100% Digital shop but I have
    	seen their classified ads for VMS help in the past. Perhaps the bad
    	press was a reflection of the customer's experience(s) with our
    	stuff. (?)  This is only speculation but one would have to admit
    	the possible connection...

	InfoServer Engineering considers our mention right up front as a mixed
blessing.  We're still not allowed to do any marketing, but the product is
still here. ;-)

					--Doug

Speaking of advertising, I haven't seen any Digital ads in the Globe for
several months.

				Steve

There's a March 5 help-wanted ad from the Globe hanging outside Dave Eklund's
office.

I meant the "Whatever it takes" series.

			Steve

    How about posting the Glob article here for us to read that live
    somewhere ELSE other than Mass?
    
    We don't receive it out here in Deeetroit - (^;
    
    cs

    Re: speculation about Globe's attitude towards Digital based on their
    experience as a customer and/or our advertising $$ -
    
    I had occasion to visit the Globe a few years ago when we were improving
    the performance of VAX COBOL.  They gave me the distinct impression that
    it was a matter of professional pride (maybe even ethics) to keep
    advertising, production, and editorial content separated.
    
    Sometimes you get a good "slant", sometimes you get an ugly slant.  It's
    real important to do everything you can to encourage the good slant, and
    the P.R. people do work hard at this; but in the end there's a certain
    element of luck.
    
       /john

    The Globe's #1 ethic is selling papers.  That's the definition of
    "newsworthy."  They print Digital stuff because some editor decided it
    would achieve that purpose.  If it sold papers in Detroit, some local
    paper would print it, too.
    
    Mark

	while the Globe is hardly an "all Digital shop", they do have alot
	of our stuff in their IS world....I would say .10 and .11 more
	accurately reflect the situation....

	_kelley (former Globe technical presales amongst other things...)

	ps: the entire article under discussion is about the C&P division...
	maybe their PR folks are more on top of things? just a thought...

    re: Globe Advertising.
    
    We ran a 8 week flight of newspaper ads in the Globe through early
    January, as we did in the NY Times, Washington Post, and San Jose
    Mercury News.
    
    Compared to the lead times of magazines, about 1 month ahead of issue
    date, newspapers provide us a more timely, but more expensive per
    person reached, way to advertise. It remains in the quiver to be used
    as needed.
    
    How about a little credit going to the public relations group when it's
    due?
    
    
    

    
    Ok, Mr. Troy; now everybody put your hands together and CLAP CLAP CLAP
    
    	Hope this helps, Bill :*)	Thanks.
    
    
    		the Greyhawk

    Greyhawk - I will pass your applause along to the people responsible. 

    Clap, Clap, Clap
    
    And we still haven't seen anything in Oz.
    
    Bill

    Hey Bill,
    
    you mean your customers DONT get the Boston Globe?
    
    and, what the, you mean they dont read the Wall Street Gerbil?
    
    and, gee, I didnt realise your public broadcaster doesnt allow
    advertisements,
    
    and, hold on, this has got me stumped, what do you mean that Byte hits
    the streets three months after it cover date?
    
    and what, you can only get onto Compuserve via a 2400 baud modem and
    only through a connection 600 miles away?

Clap Clap Clap from Belgium ... where we for sure do not receive the Globe.

Marc.

    I wouldn't take the relationship between the Globe and Digital too
    personally. Newspapers always take a hard stance toward the main
    business players in their market. It's true everywhere. The Detroit
    Free Press bashes the auto industry. The Akron Beacon Journal used
    to bash the tire industry (when Akron had a tire industry). They do
    it so they won't be perceived as 'being in bed with ....'. The
    Youngstown Vindicator's business editor was considered to be in bed
    with the local steel industry (when Youngstown had a steel industry)
    and it totally destroyed the paper's credibility with regard to that
    industry which was the main business reporting they did. So they bend
    over backwards to be hardcore to make sure that doesn't happen.  So if
    the Globe is saying nice things about Digital, that's GOOD. And if they
    ignore Digital or are very objective, keep the above in mind.
    
    Charlie

Re: .13

I made the comment about not seeing recent print ads, Bill, because you had
said earlier that the TV ads (which I haven't seen, but that's because I
don't watch TV) are running with collateral print ads.  I haven't seen any
print ads in this series since January.

					Steve

    Steve,
    
    The print ads run in the Wall St. Journmal weekly, plus until recently
    in Forbe and Fortune.  We have a total of 15 print ads and 7 TV spots.

Ok - I don't read any of those so I hadn't seen them - nor had I seen anyone
around here post copies as is usual.

				Steve

     <<< Note 3750.12 by KLUSTR::GARDNER "The secret word is Mudshark." >>>

>	ps: the entire article under discussion is about the C&P division...
>	maybe their PR folks are more on top of things? just a thought...

    The article I read in Sunday's Globe was not entirely about the
    C&P division, but also about new video servers, PCs, etc.
    
    Mark.
    

  At least they do if I recognize them as ones I haven't seen before.

						Trace

>>	ps: the entire article under discussion is about the C&P division...
>>	maybe their PR folks are more on top of things? just a thought...
>
>    The article I read in Sunday's Globe was not entirely about the
>    C&P division, but also about new video servers, PCs, etc.

	we read the same article ;-) on reflection, I should've been
	more accurate.....other than PCs (actually HiNotes which seem
	to be getting alot of positive press btw), all of the other 
	products discussed (from memory: networks, Multia, low-end printers,
	*and* video servers) belong to the Components Division (which
	I have now been told is a superset of Components and Peripherals;
	go figure ;-)......

	_kelley

    Mr. Troy-
    
    Thx again both for your contributions to our public visibility, AND
    for your participation in this forum.  My clients are FOREVER
    commenting on our advertising, mostly positively (actually inquiring
    'bout some of our services wrt Internet adn disaster recovery) but in
    any event, aware of our company/efforts, and prompted to discuss issues
    with my sales team.
    
    Well done!
    
    SteveS

    Will somebody PLEASE post the article here.
    
    Thanks
    Little Tex
         

Unless somebody else posts it here first (hope hope :-)

					Trace

Some articles are available online from the Globe.  I don't know the details.
I sympathize with Trace -- it's a long article.

    Many kudos to Bill Troy and associates...
    
    Ignore the pundits who live in this notesfile.
    
    May the powers that be  greatly increase your budget!
    Go get 'em Bill!

    The pundits who live in this file have been asking for effective
    advertising for years.  I am sure that said pundits are very pleased
    to see that advertising has begun, and would agree that increased
    budgets would be a good thing.
    
    					andrew

VNS COMPUTER NEWS:                            [Tracy Talcott, VNS Computer Desk]
==================                            [Nashua, NH, USA                 ]

   Friday's Market					Fair Market Value
	 Quote		Change  Dow Jones	Change   1-Jun-1994   $21.375
 IBM	  83 5/8	+  1/4				30-Nov-1994   $34.437
 HPkd	 123		-  1/8				85% of lower  $18.25
 Msft	  73 7/8	+1 1/8				 1-Dec-1994   $32.375
 DEC	  35 1/4	+3	4138.67		+50.84
 DEC PRa  23 7/8	unch.

 Digital - Digital's New Equipment
	{The Boston Globe, 19-Mar-95, p. 55}
   The computer giant places multiple bets for growth
   [Photo. Caption: Digital vice president Charles Christ: "We've been in
 networking since Moby Dick was a minnow."]
   Ray Southworth never heard of the InfoServer computer until it was off the
 production line.  The late information made his work hard: It was Southworth's
 job to sell the new machine.
   But at Digital Equipment Corp., the networking products group often undercut
 its own sales team.  Run by engineers, the division gave its sales managers
 little time to advertise a product or to train workers in computer stores.
   Once the marketing began, Southworth could not tell whether his ad campaigns
 had an effect.  Digital collected sales information from computer resellers
 only every quarter, and it did not say which products were selling well in
 which region of a state.
   In fact, the Digital of even two years ago did not work hard to push such
 products as the InfoServer, which stores disks called CD-ROMs and makes the
 information on them available over a computer network.  Digital focused, for
 the most part, on one thing: Selling its flagship product, the VAX
 minicomputer.
   And when the VAX market sank, so did Digital.
   Today, Digital likes to count that kind of behavior as part of its past.  In
 its turnaround plan, it has decoupled each component of what was the VAX
 system.  Every product - the printers, video terminals, software, data storage
 devices and the main computer itself - competes separately, in its own market,
 against different industry rivals.
   [Photo. Caption: Sultan Zia oversees Digital's video server business, a
 product that Zia promises will great large profits.]
   Much attention has focused on Digital's follow-up to the VAX - the fast
 Alpha chip that powers a line of speedy computers called servers and
 workstations.  But Alpha is not the sum total of the nation's third-largest
 computer company.
   Digital is working hard to push a variety of other products, and marketing
 has finally taken center stage.  Says Southworth: "We don't build a product
 and throw it over the wall any more.  We are much more proactive."
   What products, other than the Alpha, will help Digital grow again?  Where
 might it become a leader?  Some possibilities follow.

   'Heart and soul is networking'

   More than 20 years ago, Digital devised ways for one computer to communicate
 with another.  With sophisticated software and cables, the VAX minicomputer,
 the machine that made Digital rich and powerful, could link to other VAX
 computers within an office or across the country.
   Even today, computer networks are Digital's forte, the company claims.  Says
 chief technology officer William Strecker: "Digital's heart and soul is
 networking."
   So why did we have Wellfleet Communications Inc. of Billerica, the hotshot
 networking company?  Why did Cabletron Systems Inc. of Rochester, N.H., and
 Chipcom Corp. of Southborough grow large in an industry pioneered by Digital?
   Until recently, Digital's networking products were pitched almost
 exclusively to its VAX customers.  That made its networking unit huge but not
 dominant.  With about $600 million in annual sales, the unit is growing at
 about 10 percent a year.  Digital thinks it can grow twice as fast.
   As part of its growth plan, the division has organized a force of "network
 warriors" who try to sell Digital products through computer stores and
 resellers.  Several years ago, 10 Digital employees focused on this type of
 selling.  Today, 150 workers in the United States and 100 overseas are on the
 job.
   "Networking can be a growing part of Digital, if they are smart enough to
 make marketing-based decisions and move quickly and aggressively," says
 Charles Robbins, vice president for communications research at Aberdeen Group
 Inc. in Boston.  He thinks Digital is ahead of the technology curve with two
 products in particular:  its ATM switches, which will help route video and
 computer traffic through high-speed networks of the future, and a product
 called NetRider, which helps workers on the road communicate with computers in
 their office.
   Charles Christ, vice president and general manager of Digital's components
 division, argues that Digital has an advantage because it makes a variety of
 such products.
   Elsewhere in the industry, "hub" makers like SynOptics Communications Inc.
 have merged with "router" makers like Wellfleet as their networking products
 became similar.  Digital has a hand in all of these product lines, "so we are
 further ahead than some in understanding the implications of this
 convergence," Christ says.
   "We've been in networking since Moby Dick was a minnow."

   Video servers give users the power of choice

   Sultan Zia's business was in deep trouble.  As general manager of Digital's
 VAX9000 unit, his job was to push the company's largest-ever computer into as
 many businesses as possible.  But the VAX9000, Digital's version of a
 mainframe, came out just as the mainframe business declined.  And customers
 were more likely to stick with one company that defined the mainframe business
 - IBM.
   So two years ago, Zia offered a proposal to his boss:  Let's start something
 new, in a business that is bound to grow.  Today, Zia runs one of the most
 promising pieces of Digital, its video server business.
   Video servers are special-purpose computers used to store digital
 information - like movies - and route it to viewers on request.  By Zia's
 calculation, they will be a $5 billion market by the year 2000, when
 interactive television and movies-on-demand systems are expected to be big
 business.
   "This will have big revenue and profitability, because this is a high
 gross-margin business," Zia says.
   But the market could take years to develop.  Several times, companies have
 announced trials of the video-on-demand systems only to cancel them due to
 technical problems or low customer interest.  Moreover, the field has drawn
 other big players, such as IBM and Silicon Graphics Inc.  Microsoft Corp.
 claims its entry, made from inexpensive personal computer parts, will undercut
 all rivals on cost.
   But Digital says its servers have been chosen for 18 trials or deployments
 of video-on-demand systems.
   "They have more wins than any other hardware vendor, by my count," says
 William Bluestein, an analyst with Forrester Research Inc. in Boston.
   Bluestein and Bruce Ryon, an analyst with Dataquest Inc. in San Jose,
 Calif., say one of Digital's strength is that it offers a range of systems,
 from small ones to the very large.  Bluestein says Digital is trying to build
 video-on-demand systems for hotels and television stations - smaller systems,
 but ones that could actually find buyers before the nation's big cable
 television companies deliver the large systems into people's homes.

   After years on the sidelines, Digital gets personal

   Light, slim yet bursting with features, the HiNote portable computer could
 serve as the new metaphor to the trimmed-down, product-focused new Digital.
   "I can't make enough of 'em," says a proud Robert Palmer, Digital's chief
 executive, faking a sales pitch to visiting reporters.  Orders are so
 backlogged that Digital's chief technology officer, William Strecker, has not
 been able to get one.  And that, Palmer says, is no fake.
   The HiNote is a product few expected from Digital.  Until last year, its
 laptop computers were an industry laughing stock.  As Compaq, Apple, Hewlett
 Packard and IBM tapped into the fast-growing portable market with leading-edge
 offerings, Digital seems to be in PC denial, half-heartedly slapping its name
 on nondescript portables built by others.
   Even now, spiffy as the HiNote is, technology moves quickly in the computer
 industry.  IBM, for example, recently launched a similar machine that features
 a two-piece keyboard that spreads out to full size.
   Digital is aggressively pushing its personal computers and laptops.  In
 another break from the past, the personal computer division is courting the
 consumer market, signing deals to put its computers in national chain stores
 such as CompUSA, Sam's Club, Sears and Circuit City.
   "in the previous management, PCs were considered little more than toys,"
 says Enrico Pesatori, general manager of Digital's computer systems division.
 "By the time the toys had become a $50 billion-a-year market, the company did
 change its mind."
   Digital is selling PCs at a pace of $2 billion a year.  If that rate holds
 up, personal computers will account for roughly 15 percent of the company's
 revenues this year.
   "Our presence in personal computers was nothing two years ago," Pesatori
 says.  His goal is to thrust the company into the world's top-five PC makers
 by the end of this year.  It is currently around 10th place, depending on
 which market research firm is counting.
   There will be a big celebration at Digital if it makes the top five, to be
 sure, and it would surprise more than a few industry analysts.  But no one is
 dismissing Pesatori's resolve.
   Ashleigh Davenport, of CompUSA's retail store in Brighton, says Digital has
 what it takes to distinguish PCs in a crowded market.  Digital offers service
 packages that include software consulting and one-on-one training for large
 customers.

   Linking up with Microsoft shakes on-line market

   In the world of on-line computer services, the spectre of one giant hangs
 over the market.  America Online, Prodigy and Compuserve all crow about their
 products and growth, but each lives in fear of the day Microsoft Corp.
 arrives.
   And when The Microsoft Network arrives, probably this fall, Digital will be
 there to make sure the computers, wires and help desk are working properly.
   Digital beat a strong field of competitors for the five-year contract to
 provide technical support for The Microsoft Network.  Competitors were
 reported to include Andersen Consulting, Electronic Data Systems and Sequent.
   "It was big news that Digital won, because nobody expected them to win,"
 says Christine Ferrusi Ross, an industry analyst with Dataquest in
 Westborough.  "Digital isn't really seen as one of the key players in this
 business.  They're huge, but they're not perceived as being right up there
 front and center."
   The win might indicate that Digital can expand its services and support
 business - a huge and often underappreciated part of the company.
   Worldwide, the market is booming for advice on how to buy computers and
 install them, and for support contracts like the one Digital won from
 Microsoft.  According to Dataquest, the market reached $75 billion last year
 and will top $130 billion by 1998.  "This whole market has the potential to
 make tons of money," says Ross.
   Digital's services unit accounted for a sizable $5 billion of its $13.5
 billion in sales last year.
   The company already runs the entire information services network at Scott
 Paper's large manufacturing plant in Everett, Wash.  And it manages computers
 involved in manufacturing and engineering at several General Electric plants.
   Ross thinks Digital has a chance to build this business.  "The market isn't
 saturated yet, and there's no one big player or standard, so a lot can
 happen," she says.  "They have an opportunity."

   Multia slices though networks' boundaries

   The Multia may be the world's first multilingual personal computer.
   The pizza-box-sized Multia MultiClient Desktop enables users to tap into
 machines that run different types of incompatible software, including
 Microsoft's Windows NT software, Unix and software for big IBM mainframes.
   [Photo. Caption: Digital CEO Robert Palmer says there's a backlog of orders
 for the laptop computer.]
   "It is, if you will, the ultimate terminal," says Christ, of the components
 division.  "It can move data back and forth across boundaries."
   Launched in November, the Multia is Digital's answer to the soaring costs of
 maintaining PC networks.  Typically, it is difficult to link computers that
 run on different software into a single network.  Each machine has to be
 outfitted with cumbersome layers of intermediary software, which increases the
 risk of system problems and makes it necessary to service each machine
 individually when problems arise or when new software us added.  It also
 hampers performance.
   Multias, by contrast, can be maintained centrally from the network's main
 "server" computer.  And they vastly outperform regular personal computers on a
 network.
   "If you're trying to cut costs and keep things simple, it's real
 appealing," says Michael Goulde, a senior consultant with the Patricia Seybold
 Group in Boston.  He says maintaining each PC on a conventional network can
 cost upward of $5,000 a year.  With a Multia, which costs $3,500 to $6,000,
 the maintenance cost is far lower.
   Multia won Byte magazine's award for best computer system introduced at
 Comdex, the giant industry trade show last fall.  But Digital is still looking
 to clinch a major sales deal.  "Were hoping in the next 12 months to sell a
 couple of hundred thousand of these machines," says Nina Hargus, Multia
 business manager.

   Digital takes printer fight to shelves of superstores

   If you knew Digital made printers, you were probably a Digital computer
 customer.
   That was the old rap on the computer maker.  Now, Digital's printer division
 is going public and targeting nontraditional customers, especially in the home
 and small-business markets.
   Hewlett Packard Co. last year controlled about 60 percent of the $2 billion
 inkjet printer market in North America.  Digital is playing catchup.  And
 while its is unlikely to rival Hewlett Packard any time soon, analysts say
 Digital is making the right moves, wining shelf space for its inkjet and laser
 models at more than 2,400 stores nationwide, including CompUSA and Circuit
 City.
   "If you look at some of our recent printers we've announced, they're priced
 more aggressively than HP and offer more functionality and performance than
 HP," Christ says.  "We're telling people very aggressively, 'Hey, look at
 us.'"
   At least some industry watchers think the market dynamics are in Digital's
 favor.  Digital is in the retail stores now, able to reach the fastest
 growing segment of the market, says John Goetz, an industry analyst with
 market researcher Dataquest.  He gives the company credit for offering new
 low-priced products.  "Digital has brand-name recognition that a lot of other
 companies wish they had," he adds.
   So far, the numbers look good.  Digital's printer sales have more than
 doubled in the past year.

    Subtle:
    
       "We've been in networking since Moby Dick was a minnow."
    
    You see Moby Dick was never a minnow. He was a whale, a young whale
    is called a calf.  Minnow is a tiny fish.  Whales are not fish.
    Was it a slip of the tongue, or a very clever joke?

re: .33

I thought they were trying to say that Martin Minnow had somehow morphed
into Moby Dick:-)

Bob

RE: .34

	hahahahahahahahahaha!!!!

	I'm sure that Martin would be amused!

							mike

Even if he did spell his last name with one n.

			Steve

    Minnow == tiny fish
    
    Moby-Dick == Ginormous whale
    
    The gist: we were in networks when network technology was just
    starting.  Geesh!
    
    					andrew

    re .4 (and others)
    
    A quick search thru the CHAMP system show 88 line items for the GLOBE,
    ranging from network stuff and terminals to a 4000 and a 6520.
    
    I didn't see any Alpha stuff, is there a partner out there who has a 
    newspaper environment that runs on Alpha?
    
    .mike.

    RE minnow/whale ... clearly, the networking market has evolved.

    
    RE .33 >   "We've been in networking since Moby Dick was a minnow."
           > Was it a slip of the tongue, or a very clever joke?

             The joke was old when Christ was an altar boy. 

    re: newspapers & Alpha
    
    The Ottawa Citizen uses a package I think called "RIP" to do page
    layout (don't quote me on the name).  Anyway, this is completely an
    Alpha/NT solution and is dramatically increasing the number of papers
    they can publish (they've added another earlier printing).