On Sun, 25 Jan 2004, Mark Simmons wrote:
Well, you could just do what many companies do, at least here in the UK, and depreciate the equipment over the tax-man approved 4 year (or 3-year for IT equipment) cycle, at which point it has 0 book value, and who cares about its after-market value at that point?
Mark, I tend to dissagree. So to be honest, 2nd hand traders need guys like you to survive.
At least here in Asia many large companies are very well aware that their equipment once they are done with it, is still worth money. In some cases we have machines that are 5-8 years old eg Sun equipment is still hitting the market and getting back into circulation. In rare cases we have Sun boxes that are 10 years old going back into the market into production.
IMHO if you have equipment that after 3 years is only worth for giving to your technical people and can not be sold, I think you are running things a bit too tight.
When we are tearing down companies networks there is a huge difference from how much the 2nd hand equipment is worth based on how smart the CTO was at purchasing. Some brands, products and models just retain their value. A really good example is a E4000 I had, I got it with 250Mhz cpus with 4mb of cache 512MB of ram. I upgraded it to 8 x 450Mhz (8MB Cache) with 8GB of RAM, and out it went.
Structuring your assets properly into your corporation....
One of the ideas I've been having for companies to be able to transfer software and hardware like NetApp is to incorporate a separate company. So the day they go bust or they want to just sell the whole asset, the support contract and everything they just transfer a share. Out here it costs nothing to run keep a LTD company going about US$300/year.
Then you give it to your techies on the sly for their own edification and amusement. Natch.
Or better still, how about you get some money back for it?
Sounds like the HK channel needs a good kicking to me. The joys of not-quite-communism creeping in faster than expected?
I met with the Country manager and made it very clear that I can work with them. Something that Sun and Cisco will not do, as we work 2nd hand gear.
It seems that NetApp genuinely didn't know I was working on the deal, but both the distributor did know. Still no valid explanation came forward for why the Distributor treated me like they did.
Regards, Maren.
--On 25 January 2004 12:15 +0100 John Enger john@johnenger.com wrote:
At 17:54 25.01.2004 +0800, you wrote:
So that you understand where I am coming from, I am 2nd hand equipment dealer who has paid and tried to get things work out with distributors and had no help. I've tried to work with NetApps distritibutors to stop an account not to migrate to EMC....
I absolutely agree with your opinion on many of these issues. The lisencing policies that Network Appliances use are totally horrid. My former employee chose EMC over netapp just for this cause. Once installed the value of the equipment is none, because it has no aftermarket whatsoever.
It's a crying shame, because NetApp is so simple and functional, and hosts so much power.
There was a discussion on this a while back, but I think that the Network Appliances administration are horrified that changing their lisencing policies will result in massive pritating of their software.
So they choose to serve the few who are willing to pay the horrid prices of new licenced equipment, and forget about the masses who chose EMC and other solutions for economical safety, and the aftermaket.
I think this is a pretty narrowminded way of thinking. Think of all the 2.hand equipment, and the ability for this to create a second revenue. I've seen netapps sell off ebay for just a couple of hundred bucks. I think they will be running pirated Data ontap versions. Just what Network Appliances seem to fear the most. The software are pirated in a big way, both by netadmins for private use and by small companies, because the alternative of getting a legal version is finacially synonymous with buying a new storagesystem.
Thanks for your time
J.
-- -Mark ... an Englishman in London ...
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