5.0
4.5 X 6506
4.0
3.5
X 6504 3.0
2.5
X 360-65 2.0
1.5 X 370-155
~ 1108 X 6400
1108 X 6200
SIGMA9 1.0 6400
360-65
o
370-155 01106 MMo
62000.5 X 1106 MM
. X 6503
61
e
6506 X 070/60X 655
o o
6504 6503o
635X 635
o
70/61 60o
PDP10IBM UNI CDC BUR GE RCA DEC
o
SCIENTIFIC X COMMERCIALOne of the key indicators of system price is the price of main memory. You will find on the following page a chart showing just how well the Sigma 9 memory price compares with that of the other competition. Not only is memory price and important indicator, but so also are the size of the memory increments a user needs in order to upgrade his system memory capacity. Smaller increments of memory are offered on the Sigma 9 because Sigma software uses memory more efficiently, therefore, the customer gets a double bonus - more usable memory to begin with and smaller in-cremental costs to increase his memory capacity.
-.-AVERAGE COST PER CHARACTER (BYTE)
STORAGE CAPACITY K BYTES OR CHARACTERS
The chart on the following page illustrates the increment sizes available on Sigma, compared with those available on the competitive systems.
COMPANY PRIVATE
CDC 6200*
AVAILABLE MAIN MEMORY SIZES (8-BIT BYTES - KB OR 6-BIT CHARACTE.RS - KC*)
SOME SALES STRATEGY GUIDELINES
With the Sigma 9 there are two basic strategies to follow. These are:
Consolidate severa~ smaller systems into one Sigma 9 multi-use system
Replace a smaller machine - usually the next smaller size - with a Sigma 9 Let's discuss each of these strategies briefly.
•
CONSOLIDATION STRATEGIESOne of the best opportunities occurs when one of the systems at the prospective in-stallation is a Sigma 5 or Sigma 7 and the other machines are significantly smaller than the currently-installed Sigma 5/7. In this situation, the DP management in control of the Sigma equipment probably has the most political and financial influ-ence. The smaller machines mayor may not be attached to the Sigma gear. If they are not, the controlling element may be small, scientifically-oriented, and both fi-nancially and politically weak within the organization (an example of such a situa-tion would be a Hewlett-Packard system or an IBM 1800 installed in a laboratory en-vironment) dedicated to some data acquisition and analysis project. With the real time capabilities and other capabilities of the Sigma
9,
you can effectively counter any weak opposition from the users/management of the smaller systems while selling the powerful computation and cost-savings advantages of the Sigma9
to the most in-fluential group - those currently responsible for the Sigma 5/7 operations.Furthermore, with the added capabilities of XOS, you also have a good chance to absorb an IBM 360/30 or other small 360's (360/20, 25) that are performing commer-cial work. To do this, you must be able to show the cost-savings that would accrue to the user and the benefits of consolidating all operations into a central system.
Note that this represents a good way to attack IBM - not frontally, but on the flank.
There are two keys to successfully using this strategy:
The largest system currently installed should be Sigma and the Sigma manage-ment should have the political power within the organization
The Sigma system currently installed should be substantially I arger than any one of the IBM systems (meaning a 360/30 or smaller) and, if there is more than one IBM machine, the organizations controlling ea:h should be separate in management and influence from the other. This way, you may be able to get one of these organizations to support the Sigma buy and, fai ling that, their individual weakness within the orgainzation may not enable them to gen-erate sufficient opposition to the larger Sigma organization.
You must be aware, however, that IBM wi
II
try to use the same strategy with the 370/155. Presumably, the Sigma system was installed because there was a substantial amount of time-sharing and/or real time work. In order to make your consolidation strategy work, you will have to protect the currently installed Sigma equipment.This is especially crucial if the installed IBM system is as large or larger than the installed Sigma system. This means that you must carefully manage your accounts and never miss an opportunity to extol! the virtues of Sigma for real time and time-sharing as well as scientific batch and commercial batch. When IBM tries to consolidate the systems, you should point out the inherent complexity of: .
Managing an IBM system in a commercial environment, let alone combining the two environments (OS requires heavy operator intervention and system man-agement; the addition of even slow real time and scientific data acquisition makes this problem enormously complex)
Conversion of the scientific/real time/tirPe-sharing problems from Sigma to IBM, compounded by the very real possibility of having to convert upwards from DOS or OS MFT to OS MVT plus TSO plus RTM
Finally, if there is any critical real time application, it is very possible that IBM would not be able to perform at all within the response constraints and, if there is a substantial amount of high speed I/O (say data acquisition), it is possible that the IBM 370/155 (or 145) CPU performance wou Id be severely d~graded because of its cycle-stealing I/O.
Some other points about consolidation/centralization:
Where IBM has the most influence and/or largest system at an installation, your attempt to consolidate all systems will probably not succeed. Try, instead, to consolidate all the installed scientific systems or upgrade/replace the currently installed Sigma system while protecting yourself from IBM's cons-olidalion at-tempt.
You can use this strategy against other competitors where there may not even be a Sigma computer installed as the largest system. However, you will have to be very careful when one or more of the smaller systems is an IBM system.
The precise consolidation strategy you follow must be tailored to the situation.
It is impossible to discuss each of the possible alternatives here.
• REPLACEMENT/UPGRADE STRATEGIES
With the Sigma 9, you have a very potent upgrade/replacement system because of its compatibility with smaller Sigma systems and its outstanding price/performance.
In general, you should try to find opportunities where the currently installed machine has little or no compatibility with that manufacturer's next larger system. Some ex-amples of currently-installed systems that provide good upgrade/replacement oppo-tunities include:
CDC 3000 Series: These systems are old and have almost no compatibility with CDC's 6000 Series. Converting to Sigma wi II present little more
diffi-culty than converting to a CDC 6000 series system and present the prospect with many system capabilities at a lower price than CDC can offer.
UNIVAC 490/494 Series: Virtually the same comments can be made about these systems as the CDC systems. The UNIVAC 1106 or 1108 is not upwards compatible from the 490/494.
DEC PDP-10: There is no larger DEC system and hence no upwards compati-biity. Furthermore, even if DEC did produce a larqer system, past experience shows that DEC iS'in noway committed to upwards compatibility.
Others: There are many other good upgrade/replacement situati ons that wi II ari se but these do not genera Ily present as advantageous or c I ear-cut a pi cture as the above. Each of these situations will have to be carefully qualified.
However, currently-installed GE-400's will represent one of the best of these situations since we can provide a conversion aid, the TS-400 Simulator, and because there is only limited upwards compatibility to the very costly GE-600 seri es systems.
(CAUTION IBM AHEAD!)
Finally,you should be very cautious about competing against IBM in a single system upgrade/replacement opportunity where the currently-installed system is an IBM 360/40, or larger, system. IBM currently provides too many upgrade paths for these users, wi II fight I ike H- - - to protect these accounts, and provi des an easy upgrade conversion for these users. The most important of these three i terns may well be the last. IBM users sti II carry many scars from their past conversi on to 360. They are afraid to convert to any other system except under extreme duress. Since Sigma cur-rently provides only minimal conversion tools to assist this user, any attempt to directly confront IBM is paramount to suicide in all but extremely exceptional circumstances.
RCA's goal, for example, is to convert 10% of the 360/30 and below IBM users.
They have no announced goal for larger IBM systems and the blood is still deep in the executive washrooms from their last attempt to so confront IBM in the ir strong-hold. Even RCA's announced 10% IBM system conversion goa I - with a II their new conversion aids - is exceedingly optimistic. If RCA achieves 5%, it will probably cause chairman Sarnoff to buy a round of drinks for all the RCA field sales and marketi ng personne I.
In short, don't try to confront IBM head on!
• SUMMARY
There are far too many alternatives and strategies to outline here or anywhere else because of the complexities which are associated with each opportunity and each prospect1s needs. It is felt that if you follow the general guidelines presented in thjs overview and in the other Sigma 9 Competitive Sales Guides, you will achieve the most success.