Push comes to shove, where were they going to go?
Well, in CPQ's case, wherever the customers ask them to go. CPQ ships more units of SCO Unix than NT (they have over 60% of the SCO business, and more than 50% of the SCO installed base). They ship more units of Novell than NT (They have better than 50% of the Novell installed base). And despite that, they have more NT sites than anyone else. A better question would be 'where else is MSFT going to go' for an enterprise partner. That's the whole point of
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As far as the "They have to ship the machines the way we build them" quote, this is the famous 'windows experience' requirement. CPQ told them to pound salt. Buy a CPQ machine and check it out. When you power up, the first screen is a big CPQ splash screen, and the next is a CPQ screen with a variety of options, some of which lead to the standard MSFT stuff. Likewise, Dell, GTW, HP and others have now gone more to this model, after CPQ lead the way. Netscape installation is a choice on all but the Dell machines.
CPQ works to a model which simplifies the installation process as much as possible for a given customer segment. Obviously choices for a server setup with a sophisticated fortune 500 client will be a lot different from a sub-$1000 consumer machine, but CPQ's goal is to provide the most satisfying initial experience, to stimulate loyalty and repeat business. I don't think that satisfying MSFT or Intel in that process is anywhere on the product plan, it's a detail of procurement.
I hope this answers your question. I would say that any of the majors have the ability to do pretty much whatever they want in OEM contracts. It's always a matter of give and take. MSFT, Intel, and other software vendors offer a variety of incentives including joint marketing funds and 'sticker rebates' (such as Intel Inside) to get the OEMs to play their game, but it is always a business choice on the part of the OEMs. And in today's world, that is increasingly based on what will sell the best to customers, not what will make the vendors happy. |
