By Rachel Chalmers
Amiga Inc chief executive Tom Schmidt, who stepped up to replace Jim Collas in August, has confirmed that plans for a hardware revival of the fabled platform are now stone dead (CI No 3,747). In the future, Amiga will be known only as a developer of multimedia software for a variety of operating systems – no boxes, no proprietary OS. From your perspective, one big problem exists, Schmidt concedes in a letter to the faithful. What does this new direction have to do with the original Amiga computer? Quite honestly, nothing! We realize this does not satisfy the desire of the Amiga community for a next-generation Amiga.
Schmidt insists that he is committed to seeking out partners who are interested in developing a next-generation Amiga computer and operating system. He says that Amiga and parent company Gateway Inc are open to the possibility of licensing the multimedia convergence computer (MCC) product specification and design to third parties. We believe that this could be an attractive business opportunity for another company, he says. But if Amiga itself couldn’t revive the Amiga, why would anyone else even bother trying?
As for the company: We are continuing to focus our resources on setting software standards for the coming generation of internet appliances. We are not planning to offer hardware devices, says Schmidt. Under the circumstances, how can he possibly justify his continued use of the Amiga name? Easy – it’s good marketing. The internet appliance software model that we are putting together will open up an exciting new era of software development that we think will be very interesting to the type of innovative thinkers who were drawn to the Amiga computer in years past, Schmidt concludes.
