Thanks Wol,
To answer some of the points made:
Sales Growth: at the risk of getting all 'ad hominem' again, unlike Mr
fft2...@aol.com, I am quite open about who I am. I am Chairman of APT, we
are the UK U2 Distributors, that means that unless you are a large
organisation with an existing relationship with Rocket if you want to buy U2
in the UK you have to buy it from us. So obviously I know our sales
figures. Meanwhile I know Kurt, Heinz, Eric, Martin et al - our
counterparts around the world - pretty well, we meet up a couple of times a
year and share information in between. Then I also know Susie and her team
well and meet up with them fairly often and whilst I wouldn't claim to know
Andy Youniss particularly well I've had dinner with him a couple of times
and met a couple of times more since Rocket took over.
So whilst I am not going to share confidential information that is not mine
to share, I can hopefully demonstrate that when I say that licenses are
growing I am in a position to know what I am talking about. My sources are
the Rocket CEO, the Rocket VP responsible for U2, the CEOs/senior managers
of the U2 distributors and so on.
That growth won't be visible to others because it is all OEM. It's like
trying to gauge ZF's sales, most people won't even know who ZF are even
though they may use one of their products every day. That's because they
don't go out and buy a ZF gearbox, they buy a BMW (or whatever), the gearbox
comes with it. They same is true for U2, many people using it don't know
that they are using it.
It is this OEM focus that people fail to understand, the business model
where large end users develop and maintain their own applications is in
decline. Organisations want to buy applications off the shelf from software
companies, they don't want the risk and cost of developing themselves. They
don't want to be dependent on a handful of IT staff to keep them running.
This shift means that there are less end user organisations employing U2
staff and that will continue to decline. The developers are now being
employed by software companies, although not in the same volume as were
employed by end users. For contractors it's even worse, end users aren't
employing them in the same volumes as before and software companies almost
never employ contractors, we don't - never have and never will.
But this shift is good for U2 because OEM is where U2 has been for many
years. Rocket support their ISVs in developing and selling applications in
to vertical markets and that is much more effective than focusing on end
users. If I were to convince an end user to buy U2 and develop on it all I
get is one set of licenses and a maintenance fee. But if I convince an ISV
to develop on U2 I gain an ongoing revenue stream where I will sell every
time they sell.
Outreach: fft2...@aol.com seems to think that this is what the user group is
about 'Outreach. Outreach. and Outreach.' The current board (and the last
one) would probably disagree between ourselves on this, but I don't look on
outreach as being a function of a user group or, if it is, it's a small
part. A user group usually shares knowledge and help within the community
and represents that community to the vendor. It simply doesn't have the
resources, particularly it doesn't have people with time to outreach in any
meaningful way. That's not to say that outreach isn't desirable, but it's
not the only focus.
George Land
Chairman, APT Solutions Ltd
Board member, U2 User Group
On 18/03/2011 23:27, "Wols Lists" <antli...@youngman.org.uk> wrote:
> On 18/03/11 22:48, fft2...@aol.com wrote:
>> In a message dated 3/18/2011 3:34:36 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
>> george.l...@aptsolutions.net writes:
>>
>>
>>> On 18/03/2011 21:49, "fft2...@aol.com" <fft2...@aol.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> In a message dated 3/18/2011 1:02:07 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
>>>> george.l...@aptsolutions.net writes:
>>>>
>>>>
>
>>>>
>>>> Yes be sure to throw an ad hominem attack in there to try to convince
>>> the
>>>> reading audience not to listen.
>>>
>>> Not sure what element of that was 'ad hominem', but if that's how you want
>>> to take it that is up to you.
>>
>>
>> The element that says "you"... "you"... some personality trait "you are
>> perverse" "you have an axe to grind".
>> That's ad hominem. If you have an issue with my argument, than address the
>> argument, not my person.
>>
> Simple answer - it's YOUR question, so he was answering YOU.
>
> I do notice there doesn't seem to be much support for your position
> though...
>>>>>
>>>>> You clearly have no idea what Rocket does for the user group and
>>> despite
>>>>> being told that we can't take money but instead Rocket provides other
>>>>> resources with which we are very happy you still say 'where's the
>>>>> financial
>>>>> support?'
>>>>
>>>> Asked and answered. A group doesn't need to "take" money, in order to
>>>> "use" money. Address that.
>>>> Why doesn't Rocket have a budget earmarked "Money to be used to support
>>> the
>>>> U2 user group's activities?"
>>>> Why?
>>>>
> I'll tell you why. Because we are an INTERNATIONAL group. What on earth
> would we DO with the money? And, very importantly, who would SPEND it?
>
> There's 9 board members, spread all over the world. I can't remember the
> spread when I was on the board, but at 50 miles apart Brian and me were
> VERY VERY VERY close. One of the big problems was even finding a time
> for the conference call because it was the middle of the night for some,
> the middle of the working day for others, and - conveniently for some -
> just after close of business for them.
>
> At the end of the day, the board DIDN'T WANT money, because we had no
> mechanism for spending it, and couldn't see any way that would work to
> set up such a mechanism. If you've got any better ideas than we had, I'm
> sure the current board would be delighted to know!
>>>
>>> Why do you think Rocket doesn't have a budget earmarked for user group
>>> activities? You clearly have no idea what involvement they have in their
>>> user group.
>>
>> Again it's not about their "involvement" only about their "financial"
>> involvement.
>>
> And you haven't answered George's question - you clearly didn't read it.
> "Why do you think Rocket doesn't have a budget?". I certainly read into
> that the implication that Rocket DOES have a budget, and spends it on
> supporting the group (I'm out of the loop now, so I can't speak for the
> current board).
>>
>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Let's be clear about this - the support that we have asked for has been
>>>>> provided. There is nothing that we are being held back from doing due
>>> to
>>>>> lack of support from Rocket.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Then you need to ask for more. Clearly the current strategy is not
>>>> working.
>>>>
>>> Why ask for more, what would we do with it? What activities do you think
>>> the user group should be doing that are restricted by lack of money? We
>>> are a user group, not a body dedicated to marketing a technology.
>>>
>>
>> Outreach. Outreach. and Outreach.
>>
> Fine. What are YOU doing to do outreach? What this group needs is
> PEOPLE, not money. Stop telling OTHER PEOPLE what THEY should do, and do
> it yourself. Ask for help if you need it, but don't EXPECT anything more
> than moral support - the chances are the board is overcommitted
> themselves and have nothing of themselves left to give!
>>>>>
>>>>> What the group needs is not support from Rocket, we have that, it is
>>> the
>>>>> active participation of U2 users willing to put their time where their
>>>>> mouths are and contribute to what the group is doing. If you want to
>>>>> contribute start putting some ideas forward and volunteering time to
>>> put
>>>>> them into action.
>>>>
>>>> Sure let's continue a strategy that doesn't work. That is a great
>>>> marketing approach.
>>>>
>>>> On your next point, I volunteer more time to promote MV than most. I'm
>>> not
>>>> willing at all, to promote Rocket at the expense of other MV Vendors, as
>>> a
>>>> volunteer with no support from Rocket themselves.
>>>>
> Have you asked Rocket for support?
>
>>>> Clearly you have no idea what I do, or what I've been doing.
>>>> Maybe you should figure that out first, before you go spouting off about
>>>> what you think I should be doing.
>>>>
>>>
>>> I have no idea who you are, you hide behind a meaningless name -
>>> ft2...@aol.com - you could be anyone. OK, so you don't want to promote
>>> Rocket, let's remember that this is a U2 user group we are talking about.
>>> It's not a Pick user group, an MV user group, a jbase user group, an
>>> Intersystems user group. It is U2, that is Rocket and Rocket support
>>> their
>>> own user group.
>>>
>>> It sounds to me like you are someone whose involvement in MV has a bias
>>> towards the non-U2 side, that is your choice but have you discussed with
>>> anyone at Rocket what their strategy is? Do you have any information
>>> about
>>> what they are doing?
>>>
>>> U2 is sold OEM, license numbers are growing, revenues are growing, ISVs
>>> are
>>> prospering. OK, so there are less companies doing their own in house
>>> development, but that is the way the market is moving. Today it is
>>> increasingly about selling applications, not databases or development
>>> tools
>>> and as a specialist at selling OEM that is good for Rocket and U2. So you
>>> think it's a strategy that doesn't work, well that's your choice, but you
>>> probably have no sight of sales figures, no idea of licenses sold, no
>>> information on which to make that judgment.
>>>
>>
>> To your claim that "license numbers are growing" I have to respond
>> {{fact}}.
>> I've seen no evidence of that. What's your evidence.
>> If you want to demonstrate your claims, than do so with sources.
>> Anyone can make claims. I can claim just as easily that everything you've
>> said is exactly upside-down.
>>
>> Claims are not worth the air into which they are propelled.
>>
> Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. But the evidence I have
> can be summed up as "IBM was surprised how vigorous U2 was when they
> bought it almost by mistake".
>
> I'm sure you don't remember the takeover by Ardent of Informix. But if
> you read between the lines, that's what happened - okay, Ardent shares
> got turned into Informix ones. But 6 months later it was the Informix
> board that was let go, and ALL the "head honcho" posts were filled with
> Ardent people. IBM reported that the U2 division was *consistently*
> recording double-digit percent growth. Yes I know they didn't publicise
> it very much, but why would the DB2 division want to trumpet the success
> of its red-headed step child? Especially as it was the only part of the
> business with that sort of growth! I don't know how things have changed
> with Rocket, but I don't see why they should have.
>
> At the end of the day, anybody can *claim* what they like. But I'd trust
> George over you any day.
>
> Cheers,
> Wol (Founder U2UG member. Member of the Founding Board)
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