Reg & William-What do you make of IBM's new Net thrust?
Here's an article from today's WSJ.
IBM Takes Swipe at Netscape,
Microsoft With New Products
By BART ZIEGLER
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
International Business Machines Corp. executives took
swipes at Microsoft Corp. and Netscape
Communications Corp. as the computer giant unveiled
new Internet products and said it is moving fast to
capture a big share of the on-line market.
At an elaborate press briefing, IBM executives claimed
that the Web-browser war between Microsoft and
Netscape is a dead end and said Big Blue will be a strong
contender in the more important piece of the Internet
business, the software that resides on "server" computers
that dish out Web pages and other information.
IBM established an Internet Division a year ago headed
by Irving Wladawsky-Berger, who formerly ran its Unix
computer unit. At the time, Mr. Wladawsky-Berger said
Tuesday, Internet hype outpaced reality. "I'm happy to
report that one year later we feel very good about the
Internet as a business for IBM," he said.
IBM appears to feel bolder as well, making
head-to-head comparisons with Microsoft and Netscape.
For more than a year IBM and its Lotus Development
Corp. unit have been cooperating with Netscape,
reselling that company's browsers and Web-server
software. Now with the release next month of Lotus's
own Web-server software called Domino, "that will signal
a serious change in the IBM-Netscape relationship," said
Jeff Papows, Lotus's president. He indicated IBM will
load Domino on its server computers instead of
Netscape's product in most cases.
Moreover, Mr. Papows maintained that Netscape lacks
the experience and employee ranks to create Web-server
software that contains the features of Domino and then to
support and maintain it. "We've got more [support]
people in Akron, Ohio, than they've got world-wide,"
Mr. Papows said. He also took issue with Netscape's
recent price comparisons with Lotus's products, calling
them misleading.
Just a few months ago Lotus was in talks with Netscape
about boosting their relationship by sharing technology --
showing how fast sentiments can change in the Internet
world. A Netscape spokeswoman said that "we feel our
relationships with IBM are as strong as they ever were."
As for Microsoft, IBM's historic software nemesis, Mr.
Wladawsky-Berger said the company is "out of their
league" when it comes to developing industry-specific
Internet applications available world-wide, such as the
system IBM unveiled Tuesday that will allow electric
utilities to sell surplus power over the Web. Moreover, he
said, Microsoft has been diverted by its forays into
on-line content, such as its Microsoft Network. "Nothing
helps us more than competitors that become distracted,"
he quipped.
A Microsoft spokesman said that though the company is
serious about interactive media, "we've got an incredibly
bright, focused hard-core group of people focused on
platforms and applications, the very core of Microsoft."
Among other announcements, IBM said it had signed up
13 new merchants for its Internet shopping mall, World
Avenue; that it has formed a service to allow insurance
companies to conduct business on-line; and that it has
created a Web offering that allows petroleum exploration
companies to tap into databases and share information. |
