A question mark is hanging over the $1m contract awarded to Informix Software Inc last January by the Czechoslovakian Federal Ministry of the Interior to provide citizen registration and administration software to local municipalities. Not only is time ticking away before the country splits itself asunder into its constituent Czech and Slovak republics, but both the ministry and the concept of Czechoslovakian citizenship will officially cease to exist on January 1 1993. Informix was contracted to supply 140 of Wyse Technology Inc’s machines, with its own database and software tools, running under Santa Cruz Operation Inc’s version of Unix. Informix’s Munich-based marketing director for Central and Eastern Europe, Werner Neibel, stated that although some systems were already in place, installation had been scheduled to take place over a number of years. He refused to say whether his company had received any payment so far, claiming that to do so would be breach of confidence with regard to OEM suppliers. Nonetheless, as the software has been given both Czech and Slovak language user interfaces, the project could conceivably continue under the auspices of the individual republics.
