Devil's Advocate: <<< Even though the big guys IBM, HP and Compaq (and certainly Dell will be there), are getting behind Itanium with serious server development, will the end customer acceptance be there? Majorly new architecture, compilers, etc. are there to be contended with. Why won't customers just stay with tried and true Sun Solaris, or IBM AIX, or mainframes? >>>
What are the chances that an end customer with a brand new application ( a clean sheet of paper) choose Solaris, AIX, or mainframe?
If memory serves properly, when a product stops selling (i.e., Boroughs (sp?), NCR, DEC, WANG, PRIME, etc) the systems in place function long after the companies go out of business. Upgrades and maintenance contracts keep the companies going for quite some time.
I suspect that Solaris, AIX, and mainframes will keep guys like you employed until you decide to retire. So no worries there. But I suspect that major new wins from here on out will be very difficult for these other guys.
What do you think?
Mary
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