Hello Thomas,
thanks for your comprehensive answer. Feels good that you as a
financial analyst believe in their future as well, my view is
from within the industry so it's easy to loose the overall picture.
> While RATL will never become mainstream like MSFT of course,
> Levy and co. are well advised to emulate some of the MSFT
> culture, like constantly feeling haunted by the competition,
> etc. I'm also speculating that Gates is kind of a "role model"
> for Levy. They have a pretty good business relationship
> (Isn't there a Rose "Lite" version in one of MSFT Visual
> ______ product?).
I do belive RATL is becoming "a sort of MSFT" in that they are
becoming as dominant as MSFT in their specific field, i.e. people
are buying Rationals offerings in a field just because it's from
RATL and that feels like a 'safe bet'. MSFT Visual Studio
product has a Lite version of Rose entitled Visual Modeler,
and Rational has had developers at Microsoft doing integration
work quite some time now.
So far there's hasn't been any attempts by MSFT to develop
competing products to RATL, and even though I'm sure MSFT
would like to acquire RATL they won't because of all the
anti-trust laws (not so sure it would be a good idea
either).
> Levy also testifying for the MSFT defense in the anti-trust
> case... I can imagine Levy trying to learn the one or other
> trick from Bill on how to run a software company... probably
> doesn't hurt.
Honestly, some of the 'tricks' of MSFT I hope RATL can stay
away from - I believe they can have the same position based on
excellence in products. And RATL should make relationships with
other companies in development tools as well, especially in the
Java camp (INPR,SYMC ?). I think it was Devlin who testified,
not Levy.
> As much as I like RATL for all of the above, quite like you
> I suppose, I will still follow it closely and would sell if
> either they fumble or my assessment changes. So far, I don't
> see any of that.
Agreed!
Best,
/Hans-Erik
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