4 ms·

As i've made clear in my other posts in this thread, i dont believe in rewrites. I've seen lots of very painful ones though, and never quite finished, nor iso-f

by fork1 9y ago

As i've made clear in my other posts in this thread, i dont believe in rewrites. I've seen lots of very painful ones though, and never quite finished, nor iso-functional. However, there are other ways to unplug the mainframe. I would disagree with the assessment that management is too dysfunctional, it depends. But if they all were like you described, i would be out of work. And it just happens that we turned off a mainframe just 2 weeks ago.

yourapostasy 9y ago
How does your sales team address your customers' concerns that they are trading one vendor lock-in (IBM) with another (your company's)? From seeing how the risk is assessed in some of my customers, the kind of emulation approach you described (I've seen one for the old HP 3000, and it worked great) sells easily when the legacy vendor is so sclerotic and rapacious that the customer's management is practically pushed out of the relationship, and the economics don't have to completely pencil out to close the sale. The customer is tied down to a smaller (usually) vendor's emulation, and trust the fidelity of that emulation over time, and furthermore, over new versions. The customer must maintain a skill inventory that isn't "current" (though some people might consider that a plus). I can think of a couple ways to address those sales objections (lock-in isn't real: can always switch back to legacy vendor if all else fails, no need to revamp staff with crucial business/domain knowledge, etc.). But I'd be really interested in how your sales team deflects them, because I anticipate this legacy software issue will only get worse in our industry over time, and not just on mainframes. I'd like to try to figure out how to bring down the friction of such sales in the future. Thanks for your feedback, really appreciated.
YeGoblynQueenne 9y ago
>> And it just happens that we turned off a mainframe just 2 weeks ago. Aw. I hope you didn't hurt it.

by fork1 9y ago

yourapostasy 9y ago

How does your sales team address your customers' concerns that they are trading one vendor lock-in (IBM) with another (your company's)? From seeing how the risk is assessed in some of my customers, the kind of emulation approach you described (I've seen one for the old HP 3000, and it worked great) sells easily when the legacy vendor is so sclerotic and rapacious that the customer's management is practically pushed out of the relationship, and the economics don't have to completely pencil out to close the sale. The customer is tied down to a smaller (usually) vendor's emulation, and trust the fidelity of that emulation over time, and furthermore, over new versions. The customer must maintain a skill inventory that isn't "current" (though some people might consider that a plus). I can think of a couple ways to address those sales objections (lock-in isn't real: can always switch back to legacy vendor if all else fails, no need to revamp staff with crucial business/domain knowledge, etc.). But I'd be really interested in how your sales team deflects them, because I anticipate this legacy software issue will only get worse in our industry over time, and not just on mainframes. I'd like to try to figure out how to bring down the friction of such sales in the future. Thanks for your feedback, really appreciated.

YeGoblynQueenne 9y ago

>> And it just happens that we turned off a mainframe just 2 weeks ago. Aw. I hope you didn't hurt it.