Microsoft Corp hasn’t changed its planned shipping date for Windows95 despite scepticism among vendors about whether the release will be on time, Mike Maples, executive vice-president for products told the Robertson Stephens & Co technology conference in San Francisco last week: the latest date is August, but some applications vendors, such as Adobe Systems Inc, have made contingency plans for sales of their Windows95-based applications for a possible delayed shipment.
Microsoft Corp’s Mike Maples also told attendees that Microsoft’s consumer software sales are growing 85%, while the market is growing at 65%, and the company expects its planned acquisition of Intuit Inc to proceed, despite objections from competitors and recent pressure on the Justice Department to be tougher in its scrutiny of Microsoft – The odds haven’t changed much – it is a legal question, not an emotional one and they don’t have any legal argument, to disapprove the merger, he declared, adding that if it is blocked, Microsoft will keep Money; the company remains on the offensive, and Maples said criticism from the judge and competitors will not prompt it to change planned features of Microsoft Network.
Activision Inc expects its gross margins to increase to 65% of sales in calendar 1995, from 42% last year, chairman and chief executive Robert Kotick told the annual technology conference, adding that Activision expects to be profitable in fiscal 1996 after losses of $2m in fiscal 1994, and more likely in the fiscal year to this month-end; hit 1995 software titles will include its Atari 2600 Action Pack.
Viacom Inc does not believe that the convergence of television sets and personal computers is imminent and therefore intends to develop content for each medium independently, Edward Horrowitz, its senior vice-president, technology told the conference, adding that construction of the information superhighway will take longer than press releases would have you believe; highlighting the differences between the two media, he pointed out that viewers sat a long way from the television screen whereas a personal computer user sat close to a high-resolution screen in a highly interactive environment so any early interactive television services will be oriented towards providing more choice, some control…but not a high degree of interactivity, Horrowitz declared, adding that Viacom cares about open access for its products – we should be able to deliver our product to the consumer regardless of the distribution medium – we want to avoid the situation where those who control and own the network or the set-top box can behave in a predatory way and deny access.
Western Digital Corp chairman Chuck Haggerty told the attendees that 1995 will be a strong year for the company, which is now primarily focussed on disk drives after an extended trail through a wide variety of sectors of the computer and chip industries: the company plans to introduce portable disk drive products in the next quarter and expects a great market opportunity in portable computer models in the coming years, he said; it will not be until next year that the company comes out with its first market entry in the high performance storage area, but the company does expect that sector to expand fast once Windows95 is shipping in volume; the company is on target to reach or exceed its goal of 30% revenue growth in fiscal 1995 when turnover should exceed $2,000m, up from $1,500m for the year to June last; it is on target for its goal of $850m in international revenues.
Pacific Telesis Group Inc’s bidding in the Federal Communications Commission auction of the spectrum for new wireless services was up to $670m as of the end of last week, vice-president for corporate strategy Robert Barbara told the conference: Pacific Telesis has bid $493m for the Los Angeles extended metropolitan area that covers much of Southern California – I’m personally optimistic that we’ve secured the Los Angeles MTA, he said.
Entertainment software publisher
Spectrum Holobyte Inc expects to be profitable in fiscal 1996 to March, chairman Gilman Louie declared in his address to the conference: it lost $85.0m in fiscal 1994 and some analysts expect it to record a loss of $1.6m in the year to this month, on sales of perhaps $103m, up from $68.2m last fiscal; Louie predicted industry-wide game software sales in calendar 1995 would come largely from titles for personal computers as traditional 16-bit video games machines are phased out, while sales of the next-generation 32-bit and 64-bit video and CD-ROM games players would not truly take off before Christmas 1996, he believes.
Electronics for Imaging Inc, which has achieved record results each quarter for almost three years with its prdoucts for adding full colour to monochrome desktop publishing documents, told Reuters at the conference that it cannot promise that this will continue: president Dan Avida told the conference that planned new products will offer far more speed with less power consumption than current products, but a cloud is that customer Apple Computer Inc has sued Electronics alleging patent infringement; Electronics has denied the allegations and is optimistic about a settlement.
Internet access provider NetCom On-line Communications Services Inc is likely to turn a profit in 1997, Don Hutchison, vice-president, sales and marketing, told Reuters following his address to the conference: earlier, he told attendees that its subscriber base has soared to north of 90,000 from 41,500 in September, and he expects the company to have 175 local access points by the end of this year, up from about 68 currently – that will make us virtually a nationwide provider, Hutchison said; this is an explosive market; NetCom has no current plans to offer a Mac version of its Netcruiser browser – We see that as a plum area, with lots of opportunity, but no, we have no plans now for a Macintosh version, Hutchison said, adding that the Microsoft Network, while presenting with a competitive challenge, would also help validate the market.
Symantec Corp chief executive Gordon Eubanks believes release of Windows95 will prove a big growth opportunity for Symantec specifically and the industry as a whole – for the utilities business, it’s a big opportunity, Eubanks asserted.
Read-Rite Corp’s acquisition of Sunward Technologies Inc last summer has been going extremely well, chairman Cyril Yansouni declared.
Communications equipment builder Pairgain Technologies Inc warned in an interview with Reuters that its net profit margin is likely to fall to 13% in 1995 as the company increases spending on research and development: Our objective is to try to spend more money on the development side – if you are 12% plus, that’s about all the market expects, I think, chairman and chief executive Charles Strauch said – our view in a technology business is that the world rewards more development and future investment than they do dropping so much to the bottom line; Strauch added that Pairgain had underestimated international demand for its products – it’s really taken off on us, way beyond what we expected, he said, even though they are still very small; Alcatel NV previously held the rights to market Pairgain products outside the US, but Pairgain is now able to market its products overseas under a memorandum of understanding signed in October.
Security Dynamics Technologies Inc, making security products for networks, expects sales to increase by around 45%, chief executive Charles Stuckey told attendees, with huge growth of the Internet one of the single largest factors driving it.
Komag Inc is positioned for excellent market growth in 1995, Stephen Johnson, president and chief executive told attendees, as disk drive sales growth continues to be driven by new multimedia software.
