Just as everybody else, my comments are based on speculation synthesized from tidbits of info gathered before, during, and since the SI acquisition. Take that for what it's worth (Sorry if I am taking the thread too far off topic).
Why did they buy SI? As with every other acquisition decision, it boils down to the whims of a very small handful of executives, each with his own plans and motivations. You could have one exec who loved SI because of past associations, and another who loathed SI because of a history of nasty competition. Both could agree to acquire SI because each could achieve a goal by having it under their corporate control. You might have even had an exec at Soft who would be willing to sacrifice the whole thing if it meant he could get a foothold into a different company. It doesn't matter if their end goals for SI were in opposition, only that it got acquired. There's a simple explanation for why the acquisition didn't make sense to the user base or many of the employees, it's because it actually didn't make sense. It was never really about any of us, we're all just downstream effects. Keeping that in mind, once the acquisition was made, there were a handful of simple requirements: 1) Tell the employees whatever they need to hear, as long as we can keep the good ones... or not, who cares. They don't have many choices to go elsewhere anyways. 2) Tell the user base whatever they need to hear, as long as we can keep the good ones... or not, who cares. They don't have many choices to go elsewhere anyways. 3) Do the minimum necessary to not get in trouble for breaking anti trust laws. These 3 requirements were followed and met, especially number 3, and that's that. Mission accomplished. PS - Tinfoil makes you sweat if you wear the hat long enough.
------ Softimage Mailing List. To unsubscribe, send a mail to [email protected] with "unsubscribe" in the subject, and reply to confirm.
