Amiga International, Inc.
Press Conference London, May 16, 1997
Petro Tyschtschenko:
"Ladies and Gentlemen, distinguished guests.
I am looking around and I see a lot of people I know.
People who have long experience with our AMIGA products and people who support AMIGA.
It is nice to see that the AMIGA platform is gifted by a community of competent people.
These strengths are going to be of critical importance for the success of the plans of AMIGA International,
which I am going to explain to you later.
Anyway, I am happy to see you all and I would like to welcome you on this press event.
I believe there is a bright future for AMIGA International, Inc.
Let me just explain a few details of importance, so that you can have a better understanding of what has happened
to AMIGA since the Commodore days.
Escom AG acquired AMIGA in April 1995.
During this time, an effort was made to revitalize the AMIGA market, however Escom went into financial difficulties
and filed for bankruptcy on July 15th, 1996.
During this time, an effort was made to develop products, but due to financial difficulties, there has not been any
significant amount of new product development by AMIGA over the past couple of years.
Since filing for bankruptcy, we have been trying to keep the marketplace alive through inventory sales by the trustee.
However, it has truly been AMIGA community that has kept AMIGA alive through the development of products based on
newer technology and software application developments.
Now that AMIGA is owned by a successful company - Gateway 2000 - there is a bright future.
Gateway 2000 is a solid and well established company in the computer industry.
Gateway 2000 has consistently been honored with awards for products and service.
Gateway 2000 is the right partner to give AMIGA new life and energy for the future.
AMIGA International was formed as a US based company in March, 1997 to acquire the assets of AMIGA Technologies GmbH.
AMIGA International will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Gateway 2000.
Over the past month, we have been very busy finalizing the acquisition, performing due diligence, setting up operations in Germany
and communicating with the AMIGA community.
We have a new office in Langen, next to the Frankfurt airport and I am happy to report to you that we are operational again.
In Langen, we will have three people handling sales, marketing and general administration.
We will be running at the beginning of June.
Since early April, we have four employees in Braunschweig that are taking care of logistics and warehousing, orderprocessing
and customer support, Internet support as well as technical service.
Finally, we are in the process of identifying an individual to manage new product development and R&D.
What are we going to concentrate on?
Implementing our strategy.
1. Supporting the existing AMIGA community
2. Leveraging the existing AMIGA technology through broad licensing
3. Assisting in developing new products based on open standards to the home computer and video/graphics market.
How will we support the community that has kept AMIGA alive?
Through conventions, press conferences, via the Internet, meetings and all useful initiatives coming from the AMIGA community.
I have already been to conventions in Germany and in Sweden and will entertain any suggestions.
Continuing to sell to the distributor network that has supported AMIGA.
Working with developers through concepts such as the "Open AMIGA Initiative" that is being formed with the support of many
of the prominent names in the AMIGA community.
The basics of success in this project is to work together with partners and to define a common path of development.
The AMIGA market can not afford a split, we must go together into one direction.
For us to keep the market alive it is neccessary to assist many companies in developing products through broad licensing.
Our licensing policy will be very open, broad and focus on licensing and standard O/S, Chipsets and the trademarks.
Also, licensing will allow the AMIGA to be spread to many different embedded applications in field such as medical solutions, simulation
applications, fitness equipment, irrigation systems and kiosk terminals.
Of course, we are looking for new partners.
Through licensing and focused R&D managed by AMIGA International, we plan to ASSIST the market place in developing new
products for the AMIGA.
We are currently EXPLORING many of the possible new products that have been suggested including such things as an operating
system upgrade and new hardware platforms.
We would like to keep the procedure as simple as possible.
We need to talk with the technology companies from the AMIGA business and exchange know-how.
It is also important that we EXPLORE an open AMIGA platform, use industry standard components to make it cheaper to
produce, faster to develop and easier to upgrade.
These things need to happen quickly, but in a very managed fashion.
With this strategy and the support of the AMIGA community and Gateway 2000, we are convinced there is a bright future
for the AMIGA.
That, ladies and gentlemen, concludes our presentation for today.
Jim Taylor and myself will be available for MEDIA interviews.
We hope that all of you will visit us at our booth, at the WORLD OF AMIGA conference.
Thank you very much for your attention".
Copyright by AMIGA International, Inc.