You're absolutely correct.
What most folks are missing is that they are still viewing PCs as the technology toys that they were for the first 15 years of their existance rather than the main engines of the information economy, which they are only now starting to become. I've been in the information technology business for over 20 years and as far as I can see PCs have only started to become "real computers" in the past twelve months. I know that will sound strange to many, but we really are at the dawn here. When crude oil was first found bubbling up in the mid-19th century in Pennsylvania it remained little more than a source of patent medicines for decades before it transformed the world. By the 1890s oil was a "mature" industry by contemporary perspective, but we can see clearly now how it was just the beginning.
The digital revolution which started in 1971 with the first 4-bit microprocessors has to be viewed in the same light. Even though PCs have been around for almost 20 years, in a world in which more than half the global population has yet to make a phone call the real digital revolution has barely started. Companies like INTC, MSFT, CPQ, CSCO, and others will grow many, many fold over the next decade.
As I said, PCs have only started to become serious computing platforms very recently. You can credit the memory glut and the arrival of the PentiumPro and WindowsNT for this. Ordinarily it would take another five or so years for them to displace the preceding technology having reached this point. We are fortunate, however, to have an accelerator in the year 2000. The real Y2K play will be the massive migration from legacy mainframe systems to clustered NT/PPro systems starting late 1997 and accelerating dramatically in 1998. As the PC server market leader, CPQ will book a huge percentage of this business (other huge winners will be the usual suspects: INTC, MSFT, ORCL, and CA). I think most observers are going to be stunned by the growth rates that will occur in these companies over the next three years. In fact, I daresay that managing this growth will pose one of the biggest management challenges for these companies. INTC in particular faces the prospect of chronic oversubscription as they attempt to satisfy a tidal wave of demand. I would not at all be surprised, for example, to see IBM pressed into service as a contract fab to help satisfy demand.
As many have observed over the years, you earn far more with your backside than your head in this business. Be patient and enjoy the ride. |
