These SYSF people are slick, but think about the following:
The Phoenix/Cybermedia product has been already market-tested
for 2 years (retail, which is the pickiest market out there) and the
second largest PC manufacturer, NEC/Packard Bell just signed up
with them. Not only has the product received several huge
endorsements, been as high as #2 business software product in
recent months, but it solves software related problems primarily,
which are 90% of the PC support problems. Cybermedia is
continually developing knowledge bases and improvements in
a company that is roughly the revenue size of SystemSoft. When
CM goes public soon, they will have huge resources (unlike
SYSF that had a few million dollars in intellectual property and support
from DEC and Intel).
Now here's the neat thing. SYSF claims 8 million units under
contract. None of these will be reality until later this year, according
to industry sources. The beta software has only been out a few
months, which means it must have tons of bugs still in it. Even
when it stumbles out onto the street in primitive form in a few months,
it is primarily a hardware "fix-it" product, which is only 10% of the
support problems on a PC.
Look at the deals. Only one non-service center (AST) is signed
up. The contract is for only 750,000 PCs the first year. At $4
a pop (the number IBD used), that brings in only $3 million TOTAL
for 1997!
Now look the ONLY two other ACTUAL contracts....DEC and Wang.
Both of these are service centers. Do you EVER see either of
these BIG DOGs in PC magazines? DEC and Wang are the joke
of the industry and are just about dead financially (read the trade
and financial press). If these guys are primarily SERVICE CENTERS
and not PC manufacturers, they want MORE calls not fewer calls.
Their very lives depend on problems, otherwise they don't get as
much money in their service contracts. Now the BIG question is
what are the 7.25 million units coming from? Certainly not DEC and
Wang PCs. They MUST be counting PCs UNDER CONTRACT.
Now here's the clincher. Even IF (and that's still a big IF) the
SYSF software worked, DEC and WANG would LOSE money,
because the PC owners wouldn't pay for their services if they
can solve most of their own problems. Now DEC and Wang
are good at losing money, but I don't think they'd be as friendly
with SYSF under those circumstances.
Any "call avoidance" (or whatever you want to call it) product must
be sold to the actual OEM manufacturer to be of any real economic
value. The manufacturer has already sold the PC and doesn't
get one more dime of revenue for answering warranty calls. Thus,
the UNPROVEN, UNSHIPPED, UNRELIABLE, SystemWizard
product has REALISTICALLY $3 million in revenue from ONE
REAL customer over the next 15 months! Stick that in your ears,
you SYSF slick operators. How long can you keep up this charade? |
