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 c

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.