Word: compaq
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...corporate customers, computers once meant IBM mainframes. But that has changed as high-powered workstations and personal computers from such companies as Compaq, Apple and Sun Microsystems have won over legions of business users. As a result, IBM's earnings have slipped from $6.6 billion in 1984 on total sales of $46 billion to an estimated $5.5 billion last year on total sales of $60 billion. In an attempt to cut its costs and become a more nimble competitor, IBM last week announced its fourth belt-tightening program in three years...
...these breakthrough products look hopelessly oversize. Last month Compaq unveiled a 2.2-kg (6-lb.) full-powered portable computer that fits in a briefcase. Sharp and Poqet make even smaller models that slip into a suit pocket. Today there are fax machines, radar detectors, electronic dictionaries, cellular telephones, color televisions, even videotape recorders that fit comfortably in the palm of a hand...
...they are rapidly downsizing, junking their mainframes in favor of smaller, more flexible workstations, made by companies like Sun Microsystems. Because of this shift, mainframe sales are expanding only about 5% annually, less than half the rate of a few years ago. Says Rod Canion, president of Houston-based Compaq: "The rules are changing, and it's very difficult for the big-computer makers to accept." At the other end of the spectrum, some PC makers are getting hit with a different problem: a glut of machines. Says Michael Dell, who heads an Austin-based PC maker that bears...
...industry cools off, entrepreneurs are no longer so eager to enter the business and can no longer so readily get financing. Many venture capitalists are shunning computer companies, largely because of mounting losses on recent start-ups. Says Houston venture capitalist Edward Williams: "Compaq and Apple -- those opportunities in hardware have come and gone. It's too risky at the moment. It's an industry that's maturing." Adds Sematech's Noyce: "Nobody's going to be very interested when the last people in it got stung." According to Venture Economics, a market-research firm, the number of computer-hardware...
After years of red-hot growth, the industry is maturing. Companies are launching more products, yet few are truly innovative. -- But Compaq's new laptop is likely to score...