Metrowerks is raising cash so that they can continue to grow very quickly. They have gone from 30 employees to 180 in about 3 years, and their revenue has increased from about $3M to about $26M in that time ('94 to '97? - I don't have the figures handy, this is ballpark).
Among the things they have recently done are:
* Opened an office in Tokyo.
* Put out products for programmers of "embedded systems" like WinCE, PlayStation, PalmPilot, etc.
* Bring the Windows-hosted development environment up to the level of the Mac-hosted product.
* Greatly improve their Java support.
* Refine plug-in API so others can write editors, compilers for CW.
I have used their CodeWarrior product a lot in Mac programming, and it is clearly the best there. I'm glad to be able to use it on the PC now for Java programming, as the other products (from IBM, Symantec, etc.) each have at least one big problem.
BTW, I just bought a few hundred shares of MTWKF today, taking advantage of the lower price. I do think the spread sucks, but in a few years it won't matter whether I have to pay 8.25 or 8 for the shares.
Good Luck,
Sam |
