CTM ComputerTechnik Muller GmbH, the office computer systems maker based in Konstanz in the extreme south of West Germany on the shores of Lake Constance, is a freestanding company again following a buyout from the Standard Elektrik Lorenz AG subsidiary of Alcatel NV. Apart from the IBM-compatible peripherals marketing business, Alcatel has shown no interest in any of the computer industry investments built up by ITT before its European businesses moved into the Alcatel and ComputerTechnik Muller did not even fit in with any of ITT’s other operations, though Standard Elektrik bought the small business systems company, which built minis to run its proprietary ITOS operating system, to pursue the chimera of the convergence of computers and telecommunications. It was quite the wrong vehicle for that, since it had no experience in communications. After being shopped around Bull SA, STC Plc and AEG AG, the company has gone to two former Commodore International Ltd managers, Harald Speyer, who was European chief and turned round several Commodore country operations in his time there, and Walter Bartholoma. They are optimistic that they can turn the loss-making company around and bring it back into profit next year, al though it is believed to have lost well over $5m on sales of $20m last year, according to Computerwoche. The new owners believe the company lost its way when it tried to div ersify as a systems house, and plan to bring it back to its roots as a systems manufacturer addressing the public administration, small busin ess and manufacturing markets with new stand-alone and networked work stations running Unix. It also plans to major on applications written in Basic for RISC hardware. The two former Commodores now hold 67.2% of the 17-year-old former family firm that was founded by a refugee from Nixdorf Computer AG. Finance came from a private bank and a private investor. The part ners aim to build CTM into a broad-based firm operating Europe-wide.
