From: prim!dave@germany.eu.net (Dave Griffiths)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Stability of Next as a company
Date: 23 Aug 92 19:55:08 GMT
Organization: Primitive Software Ltd.

In article <1992Aug22.203141.956@wolves.uucp> lance@wolves.durham.nc.us (Lance Brown) writes:
>Hello,
>
>I would like to get some opinions on how stable NeXT is as a company.  I
>have been an avid fan of the NeXT boxes since they came out and am strongly
>considering buying one for personal use at home.
>
>I also have friends who are impressed with these machines, but feel that
>the company is just NOT going to last and they will end up with an orphaned
>machine if they buy NeXT boxes.
>
>What do you think of the long term stability of the company?
>

Unless something drastic happens, NeXT don't have a chance of surviving.
(This is not a widely shared view in this news group, but then the people
here seem to be sustained by something approaching religous faith. When the
crunch does come, expect widespread shock and disbelief). The reasons I
believe they are in trouble are:

1) Their sales are declining, rather than increasing. Over here in Munich,
   everybody in the NeXT centre was depressed at the poor worldlwide sales.
   (NeXT soon cured their depression by sacking most of them :). Rumour (and
   that's all we have to go on) has it that there was a brief flurry of
   excitement and good sales after the Station was launched last year (this
   ties in with the only announcement by NeXT of quarterly sales back in
   April 91). Since then it's gone quiet. An awful lot of boxes are piled
   up in dealer's warehouses.

2) The major software companies have stopped porting and upgrading their
   software on the NeXT. If NeXT were growing vigorously, the big companies
   simply wouldn't ignore them in this way. To get some perspective, step
   outside the NeXT world for a while: NeXT might as well not exist.
   Every man and his dog is gearing up for Windows NT. Lots of people want
   to run the same software on the NeXT as they can run on Windows or Mac,
   and no matter how good the homegrown software is, it would be reassuring
   to have the large companies supporting the platform.

3) Lack of money means NeXT are cutting costs in places which will hurt them
   more than the money they save. Examples: charging developers for support,
   lack of advertizing, dropping support for OD/Dimension, inability to
   cut hardware prices.

4) Steve Jobs is displaying signs of flailing around trying desperately to
   find a niche for NeXT. The result is that NeXT lack focus. We've had:
   education, multimedia, group productivity and now that marketing
   mouthful, mission critical custom apps.

5) None of the above would matter if NeXT had something up their sleeve,
   something sufficiently momentous to make people sit up and take notice, to
   turn the market around. But they don't. Release 3.0, no matter how nice it
   is, is an incremental step forward (contentious view point. Something like 
   the rumoured OO database replacing the file system would have been
   revolutionary). The new hardware is late late late (we were all expecting
   it to be announced at NeXT Expo remember?) and when it comes will
   probably be too expensive. The one big ace that NeXT could have played is
   NeXTStep 486, but they seem really half baked about it. The latest
   release date is Q1 93 !!! Why? By that time Windows NT will be out. And
   the pricing that they've announced for it proves that they're not really
   serious about it. $1500 for an end-user licence! This in a cut-throat
   market where you can buy the hardware for that.

With their current policies, NeXT are in trouble and cannot survive in their 
current form. Which is not to say that NeXTStep itself won't survive...

Dave Griffiths

PS: I want NeXT to survive. At the end of September I give up my well-paid
    consultancy job to become a full-time NeXT developer. So why be so
    negative about NeXT? It could be just fear of poverty :-) On the other
    hand, I feel like someone who's just gone for a stroll on the deck of the 
    Titanic. It's night-time and the ship sails serenely on as people party 
    below. I can just make out this white smudge on the horizon. Maybe if I 
    shout loudly enough, we can avoid it. But there's no sign of the captain 
    and downstairs the band play on...