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pre-internet, the usual path towards success in the tech world was 1) spend a billion or two to create a monopoly, then 2) soak your customers for all you can g

pre-internet, the usual path towards success in the tech world was 1) spend a billion or two to create a monopoly, then 2) soak your customers for all you can get. examples: lotus, compuserve, aol. post-internet, it is now far easier for good ideas to triumph over companies with big piles of cash. adobe looks to me like a company that's still trying to play by the old rules. it's amazing to me that they've lasted as long as they have.

bdfh42 18y ago
Yup - I can remember helping to launch an ISV back in the late 80's. The idea was to specialise in DEC VMS systems. We took out a loan and purchased a Vax but could not believe how much DEC wanted for the development tools. The thing was that DEC saw us only as customers and thus expected to make a direct and positive contribution. They could not conceive of us as partners aiming to bring them more sales into the future as our systems sold to end users. Still DEC are gone but the ISV is still trading (in new markets of course) so draw your own conclusions.
tl 18y ago
Autodesk is also still doing well. The formula for Abode, Autodesk and friends is to write an application that can't easy be duplicated in a browser, that businesses will buy for employees, and then build a barrier thought file formats and marketing to prevent other desktop software from competing.
- allenbrunson 18y ago
  yeah, that's a better explanation of how that model might still work today.
josefresco 18y ago
Pre-Internet the usual path towards success was 'spend a billion to two" dollars? I wouldn't say spending a billion is 'usual', in fact the companies you mentioned are all very, very unusual given their huge success. There's a 'real world' of software development that doesn't have billion/million dollar budgets and it's been around long before the Internet. Entrepreneurs in their early 20's sometimes have a hard time realizing that the world of applications existed long before they (or the Internet) were even born.

bdfh42 18y ago

Yup - I can remember helping to launch an ISV back in the late 80's. The idea was to specialise in DEC VMS systems. We took out a loan and purchased a Vax but could not believe how much DEC wanted for the development tools. The thing was that DEC saw us only as customers and thus expected to make a direct and positive contribution. They could not conceive of us as partners aiming to bring them more sales into the future as our systems sold to end users. Still DEC are gone but the ISV is still trading (in new markets of course) so draw your own conclusions.

tl 18y ago

Autodesk is also still doing well. The formula for Abode, Autodesk and friends is to write an application that can't easy be duplicated in a browser, that businesses will buy for employees, and then build a barrier thought file formats and marketing to prevent other desktop software from competing.

allenbrunson 18y ago
yeah, that's a better explanation of how that model might still work today.

josefresco 18y ago

Pre-Internet the usual path towards success was 'spend a billion to two" dollars? I wouldn't say spending a billion is 'usual', in fact the companies you mentioned are all very, very unusual given their huge success. There's a 'real world' of software development that doesn't have billion/million dollar budgets and it's been around long before the Internet. Entrepreneurs in their early 20's sometimes have a hard time realizing that the world of applications existed long before they (or the Internet) were even born.