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Technology Stocks : Siebel Systems (SEBL) - strong buy? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (6720)	5/20/2003 8:52:10 PM
From: Stock Farmer	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 6974

LOL... funny Lizzie. I've contracted stuff out to India. With excellent results. You get what you specify. There are enclaves of technical capability (horses for courses) in all of the areas I cited that were within my experience, equal to or superior to those I could marshal in SV. On a whole-cloth basis. What I mean by whole-cloth is this: if I am trying to get a project done, in a reasonable period of time, then on a budgetary basis it might cost me X M$ in SV, Y M$ in Ottawa and Z M$ in Tel Aviv, for example. Total costs, including rework and product support. Generally, and again in my first-hand experience X was bigger than Y which was bigger than Z for identical parameters. The biggest determinant in all cases was labor, and my cost figures did not include stock options! Add them to the pie and there's no contest for who comes out most expensive to do the same job. No contest. It may not have crossed your mind, but it doesn't matter if it takes 2x as many people to do a job if people cost 1/4x as much. Quite amusing: If you had ever actually tried to use an indian software firm to produce top quality production software you'd know that. Or if you've ever read anything about software quality from some journal. Or if you ever KNEW anyone who worked in software at a management level. I mean anyone. Because I have actually not only tried to use an Indian software firm, but also succeeded more often than not, and learned in the process. I've authored material on the subject of software quality. And been a low level code jockey, manager and executive for a broad range of high reliability industrial strength software systems. Over the last decade and then some. Have you ever contracted out any project to any foreign firm yourself? If not, kind of arrogant to discuss the results as though you are some kind of expert with someone who has managed many. And if you have tried, have you succeeded? If not, and others have, that may be more of a statement of your own ability in managing subcontracts than in the inability of foreign firms to deliver. And so on. Have you ever built a tech team outside of SV? One that succeeded? Again, that too might be more of a statement of your ability as a manager and leader and judge of talent than anything else. Just because you have a high opinion of yourself and your ideas doesn't mean it's well placed. John