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Strategies & Market Trends : The Thread Formerly Known as No Rest For The Wicked -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tim Luke who wrote (3003)	12/12/1998 9:27:00 PM
From: Glenn	Respond to of 90042

The institutional buying of a low priced company really caught my eye. I agree, aplx is worth a look. Glenn

To: Tim Luke who wrote (3003)	12/13/1998 12:13:00 AM
From: Nazbuster	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 90042

Tim, re: Applix. Not a pretty picture so far. They are betting on their new line of software which is Unix based and runs on "thin client" (network computers rather than PCs). Oracle's Larry Ellison has huge investments in thin client, but it has been badly hurt by the advent of low cost PCs. When decent workstations were $2000, the prospect of a $500 box was attractive. Now that full PCs are available for under $1000, the attraction is less, especially since not all applications have been successful on thin client. (It's definitely getting better, though, and there are some great benefits to be derived from controlling applications from the server end.) From the SEC filing: During the past several years, the Company has derived the majority of its revenue from its Applixware product family; however, Applixware sales have been declining in recent quarters. The Company expanded its product offerings with the introduction of Applix Enterprise, based on technology acquired in its acquisition of Target Systems Corporation in late 1995, and Applix TM1, acquired through its acquisition of Sinper Corporation, in late 1996. In addition, the Company has developed and introduced the Applix Anyware product line, which delivers the functionality of Applixware, Applix TM1 and Applix Enterprise to "thin-client" computing environments (i.e., systems running a Java-enabled browser such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Explorer). The future success of the Company is substantially dependent upon these newer product lines, and there can be no assurance that these new product lines will achieve the sales levels anticipated by the Company. In addition, the short-term financial performance of the Company will be largely contingent on its ability to continue to generate substantial revenue and profit from its Applixware product line until its newer product lines achieve greater revenue and profitability, and there can be no assurance that the Company will be able to do so. Moreover, the existence of a number of different product lines presents management, sales and marketing, and product development challenges, and there can be no assurance that the Company will be successful in addressing these challenges. The Company's financial performance will also depend significantly on sales of the Applix Enterprise product line, which addresses the CRM market. The Company believes this market is growing rapidly, but the Company is a relatively new entrant into this market and faces intense competition from larger companies such as Remedy Corporation, Vantive Corporation, Clarify, Inc., Siebel Systems, Inc., IBM, and others. The Company's Applix TM1 product line competes with product offerings from Oracle Corporation and Hyperion Solutions (formally known as Arbor Software.) This represents a more competitive environment than the Company has historically faced in its UNIX market and will likely result in lower prices and lower gross margins for the Company's products. Substantially all of the Applixware licenses sold by the Company are for use on UNIX operating systems. As a result, the Company's financial performance is significantly dependent upon the continued market acceptance of this operating system and continued sales of UNIX-based workstations, particularly by Sun Microsystems. With newer operating systems that permit 32 bit processing on the desktop, such as Microsoft Windows/NT and Windows 95, the Company is now competing directly with vendors of PC software applications such as Microsoft, Lotus and Corel.