Prismer2
Member
Registered: Aug 2002
Location: St. Louis
Posts: 108 |
I am an engineer and an MBA (in Marketing), and I have worked most of my career in Manufacturing. If more Marketing people had an engineering background, and more engineers had some marketing background, a lot fewer mistakes would be made and there would be less of the "design it, then through it over the wall" to manufacturing and marketing to do the best they can with no input to the design process.
Conversely, fewer marketers would become simply the "Yes Man" to customers and company executives who say, "Yes, we can make that for $XXX and have it ready in YY months," and THEN go ask engineering and manufacturing people, "Can we make that for $XXX in YY months?" Of course, by then Y months have already gone by and $XX have already been spent in developing prototypes that may or may not be what the market needs/wants.
I enjoyed viewing the website on the "83" by Tiqit Corporation. It is a brilliant product and I am sure it will find a highly profitable niche in the market. Unfortunately, I don't have $1000 to $2000 to spend on a palmtop Windows/Linux/Unix PC, but many corporate customers might. This is definitely not a product for the mass market, not yet anyway. For the same money you can get a really nice laptop that fits in a briefcase, plays DVD movies, has a squintless screen (hi res graphics), is superfast and powerful (number cruncher), and is highly configurable and adaptable to multiple uses. For down and dirty portability and organizer/scheduler as well as simple word processing, spreadsheet, and communications functions, it will be hard to beat the PalmOS PDA in bang for the buck.
To answer the last question: No, I do not know why Handspring would not allow the J.I.T. vendor to sell their products, but I can make some educated guesses. Successful J.I.T. selling as you have noted, requires that the product be always available. Handspring may have had problems with their Far East suppliers in making that kind of commitment. There may even have been personality conflicts between executives for the two companies, often a stumbling block when two companies are going to "get in bed" with each other, so to speak. Taking a course in Business-to-Business Marketing last year, I did learn that the type of marketing channel you refer to is very difficult to accomplish successfully, requiring a lot of cooperation and integration of the various sales, procurement, data processing, and logistical functions in the partner companies.
Generally, it IS a good idea to have as many channels of distribution as practical, that being the key word. It is likely that J.I.T. distribution, for whatever reason, was just not practical for upstart Handspring, while Giant Sony and more established Palm Corporation had already developed the logistical tools and facilities to make J.I.T. practical for them.
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The Prismer
"I am not a number, I am a person!"
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Laptop Competition
07-25-2002 06:14 PM
Ahmen Brother!
). It is easy to misinterpret what someone is saying. Sometimes, not even all the smiley faces in the world help to convey someones intent. I meant I hope you can find a PDA you are happy with when your Pro dies now that Visors are becoming extinct. I too have been very upset at Handspring's business moves, but as Joshua and others have pointed out, we are not the bulk of the market. We are few compared to the masses who wander into Stores and buy something off of the shelf. Most people here research things online and are more interested in the high tech features, but we are the minority.
Every Cloud has a Silver Lining......
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