Applix’ West German value-added reseller, the 20-year old Hoescht-owned and pretentiously named mbp Software and Systems GmbH in Dortmund, has managed to score big and secure contracts worth $250,000 this year and perhaps $850,000 overall from Ciba Geigy, the Swiss pharmaceutical maker, and Munich’s prestigous research consortium, the Fraunhofer Institute, for Applix’ office automation software, Alis. The Swiss will install Alis on 70 Sun Microsystems workstations, using an mbp-developed gateway to IBM DisOSS and SNA host systems, in its scientific computing centre and in its Project Stars, a data processing system used by biologists and chemists in the company’s agricultural research department. The Fraunhofer Institute will use Alis in a multi vendor environment across 200 workstations and minis from DEC, Hewlett, IBM and Germany’s own Unix specialist PCS, now owned by Mannesmann.
