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Path: acorn!not-for-mail
From: pbondar@acorn.co.uk (Peter Bondar)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.misc
Subject: DON'T CLOUD THE ISSUE WITH FACTS!- The ART director speaks!
Date: 15 Sep 1995 14:32:24 +0100
Organization: Acorn Computers Ltd, Cambridge, England
Lines: 89
Message-ID: <43bv99$avu@acorn.acorn.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: acorn.acorn.co.uk
> From Peter Bondar, Director, Applied Risc Technologies (a division
> of Acorn Computers).
To all concerned,
OK this looks like the final conflict so here goes,
I have watched the mail flying around and would like to put the record
straight. I am the big cheese, head honcho, numero uno of ART and what
I says goes!
1: I personally want to build cool and funky computers for as long as
there is the remotest financial justification to do it!
2: We have absolutely no plan to drop Risc PC/A7000/RiscOS AT ALL!
3: We cannot justify the R+D to build funky computers solely for UK
Education.
4: We can sell LOADS of R+D/Design skills to LOTS of people all over
the world.
5: We can make loads of money out of this (witness our share price
staying up, why? because the city analysts can see the demand for
ARM based designs/technologies) and that money and technology
transfer will come back to help produce funky technology which we
can afford to put back into our "normal computers".
6: By expanding our customer base intelligently we can generate
profits that can pay for more R+D, which delivers more weird
products so that we can all salivate away.
7: Yes we have restructured our former technical division and yes we
have lost some people and NO we did not enjoy doing that!
8: What we did do was to completely redefine our processes and
procedures for building products and the people we have lost are
largely (90%) people involved in project management, drawing
office, paper shuffling and services that can be bought in from
dozens of companies around Cambridge.
9: We HAVE kept the bright people who are the future intellectual
worth of the company.
10: Much as I have spent most of my working life in marketing it has
always been in high tech companies,and with a degree in solid
state physics and computers and having built compilers and PLL
decoders and programmed extensively for the first two years of my
working life as well as being a ham G6FTE, I do consider that I
have a reasonable grip on the technology, so DO NOT judge the book
by its cover!
11: Acorn did need a fundamental kick up the backside into the late
20th century, I speak for many of my colleagues who have wanted to
improve the financial and technical performance of Acorn and have
felt frustrated in our inability to bring about the changes
required to be successful on a global scale. David Lee has allowed
us this opportunity and frankly its a breath of fresh air!
12: David Lee our MD is anything but an "intel lover" but recognises
the fact that if somebody wants to buy 50,000 PCs and 10000 macs
why don't WE sell them. It DOES NOT detract one jot that we can
sell 50000 RiscOS computers AS WELL!
13: There is no 13.
14: I can assure everyone that if we did not undergo a fundamental
restructuring then a number of us WOULD have left and the old
school would have sailed into the sunset, copyright SS Titanic,
Crisis what Crisis!, and the band played on!
15: I would have credited some of you with sufficent understanding of
the whys and wherefores of "the City", "beancounters" etc that for
us to present a series of problems to the rest of the world and to
say "business as usual" would result in hysterical laughing from
our competitors and partners, GET REAL!
16: What some readers of comp.sys.acorn forget is that Anoraks are not
understood by the vast majority of the world, yet we despite all
the carping, STILL run the CLAN and STILL will spend #250,000 on
Acorn World, STILL plan to ship the Multiprocessor card (image in
the CLAN public area), STILL will produce very high performance PC
cards (first showing Acorn World) mainly for Anoraks, STILL will
produce 3rd generation Risc PCs DESPITE the fact that schools do
not need the graphics and go that this will give, WHY? because we
are all Anoraks here as well in Acorn Education, ART and OM (not
to mention some in ARM) and WE WANT TO! and WE CAN and WE WILL
even if you disbelievers cannot hack it yourselves!
17: My guys as I type this are already in the design process for the
successor to the Risc PC and if we choose to use a few bit players
such as DEC semiconductor, IBM Blue Micro, FTDI and Apple then I'm
sorry but you had better rush off and buy your wonderful pentium
boxes if you think that's where it's at! My guys don't happen to
think so and we will prove you wrong!
For those who still wwe can hack it please come along to Acorn World
where I will personally answer your question about the future
strategy.
There will be an exclusive briefing for Clan members that will cover
in more detail where we are going.
The Empire Strikes Back!!!!!!!
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