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Technology Stocks : Compaq -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: rudedog who wrote (66928)	8/24/1999 11:12:00 AM
From: Captain Jack	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 97611

And a little more competition.. FOCUS-Siemens, Fujitsu launch European PC firm (Adds details from news conference, background) By Melanie Cheary FRANKFURT, Aug 24 (Reuters) - Germany's Siemens AG (quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: SIEG.F) and Japan's Fujitsu Ltd tied the knot on a new joint venture on Tuesday which aims to become the largest personal computers firm in Europe by 2001. Fujitsu Siemens Computers said it wants annual unit sales growth of 40 percent and revenue growth of 25 percent, positioning it to compete with world number one Compaq Computer Corp (NYSE:CPQ - news) in the European market. The 50/50 joint venture, to be based in the Netherlands and combining Fujitsu's European computer business with Siemens' computer systems division, expects European sales of more than six million units in 2001 and 7.5 billion euros in revenues. The company said in a statement it also plans to reduce operating costs as a percentage of revenue by three to five points and would make it a priority to expand in the United Kingdom, where the two firms lag in market share. Fujitsu and Siemens executives present at a news conference declined to forecast profit goals for the firm, but said it would sharply improve operating performance in its first year. In addition to the creation of a new European computer company involving production, supply and sales, Siemens and Fujitsu said they had also agreed to cooperate in the area of global sales. Ending weeks of speculation, Fujitsu Siemens said that Siemens Information and Communication Products President Rudi Lamprecht would be its chairman and Fujitsu Computers (Europe) President Tetsuo Urano would be vice chairman. There had been speculation that the deal, first announced on June 17, had been delayed due to a failure to reach agreement on who would head up the new company, which is due to start production in October. Fujitsu Siemens said it had also appointed two operating presidents to run the business. Fujitsu's Winfried Hoffmann will be responsible for sales and marketing and Siemens' Robert Hoog will head up products and supply. ``It is a merger of equals. It is not one company acquiring the other. It is not one winner and one loser,' said Hoog, adding the company would successfully compete with Compaq and rival Dell (Nasdaq:DELL - news) because it was Europe-based and therefore able to act rapidly and flexibly within that market.