Why would a company spend 7000 dollars for Topro's CD, when they could go directly to the manufacturer and have them do the fix?
By now you've read four other answers, but here is Jenkin's answer to your question from the conference call:
"So in a straight forward model, you've got somebody who buys 1 CD. He pays 4000 for that, he's going to pay 5 for the vendor compliance data base access, and he's then going to pay $200 per vendor
compliance report. Most organizations that we're looking at on the small end of the "average range" would have at least 100 unique devices in their facility."
100 unique devices in a small facility. Before they fix the problems, they have to identify the problems. 30 - 40% of those devices will not be Y2K compliant. Without the CD a company would have to contact dozens of vendors, get round-a-bout answers, figure out which devices are non-compliant, and then oversee the entire remediation process, one device by one device; each vendor's timeline by each timeline. Not to mention that many devices are no longer supported by its original vendor. This process of simply assessing the situation, let alone fixing it, would shut down an IT department for weeks. No on-going concern can afford to do that.
And, $20K -$35K in assessment fees amounts to loose change under the machinery in a multi-million dollar operation.
By the way, Jenkins mentioned in the CC that large companies potentially have great negotiating leverage against that $20-35K pricetag. I hope Jenkins doesn't really believe that. If TPRO (and their CD) is the only game in town for both the assessment and remediation phase in embedded systems, with time running out, TPRO HAS ALL THE LEVERAGE in negotiating price. To Jenkins I say: Stand firm on your margins, and the business will come around anyway!!! |
