Amdahl Europe and Uniplex Ltd have announced details of a joint marketing initiative designed to bring business software running under Unix to the world of the corporate mainframe. Under the terms of the agreement announced yesterday, Amdahl gains exclusive rights to market Uniplex’s Unix-based suite of office automation software and productivity tools to its mainframe customers with UTS software licences. In addition, the mainframe manufacturer gains non-exclusive rights to market the product range to other UTS users. The Uniplex family covered by the deal comprises the II Plus core product, providing word processing, spreadsheet and database applications, the Uniplex Advanced Office System tool kit – electronic mail, report writer, card index and time manager – and the Advanced Graphics System module. Prices depend upon the kind of processor used, but will start at UKP24,000 for the core product. Short-term, the agreement is confined to countries within the European Community, plus Norway, Switzerland and Sweden; current talks are, however, being held between Amdahl Corp and the autonomous arm of Uniplex in the US, where the UK software company has developed a strong market presence. Amdahl claims 20 serious UTS software licences in Europe, but estimates that at least 50% of its 400-strong Eurpean customer base has been running Unix on smaller machines, and will welcome the chance to consolidate Unix-based operations within a main-frame environment – a trend backed up by the findings of an Amdahl Executive Institute research project, conducted last year. For its part, Hemel Hempstead-based Uniplex describes the benefits as the establishment of a relationship with a large mainframe manufacturer, and a widening of its customer base. In addition to its UK and US bases, the company, which claims it now stands at number 10 in the Unix software arena, has just opened a branch in Munich, and plans to open an office in Paris very shortly. Initial key targets identified by both parties are UTS licence holders in Germany, the UK and France, where Amdahl anticipates the sale of 10 Uniplex licences within 12 months: other prime markets are considered to be the Scandinavian countries, where a growing interest in Unix is becoming manifest. Microcolour Graphics, the DEC compatible terminals subsidiary of Bradford-based display equipment manufacturer Microvitec Plc, has launched a Uniplex-compatible graphics terminal. Aimed at users of Uniplex’s office automation software the Motorola 68000-based M4305MU terminal was developed with Uniplex technical support and has a list price of UKP1,420. It offers Tektronix 4105a software compatibility, and supports VT220 style soft keyboard enabling most of the keys to be redefined which allows users to download Uniplex command sequences.
