Interactive Systems Corp’s new identity as part of Sunsoft Inc has left Unix System V.4 users high and dry looking for alternatives, according to competitors such as UHC Inc, Houston, Texas; Microport Inc, Scotts Valley, California and Esix Computer Inc, Los Angeles, California. Those companies have eagerly snapped up cast-off users, and all report significant surges in business since Interactive’s merger with Sunsoft and subsequent endorsement of Solaris. The deal has had a profound effect on the Unix System V.4 market, says Spike Kasper, president of Microport: Interactive stayed in just long enough to ship its beta V.4 versions… now its users are committed and we’re selling the licences. This is echoed throughout the System V.4 vendor community, which claims to be riding the wings of success since the takeover. UHC said that the flood of orders it has received has wiped out its complete inventory this quarter, exceeding projected sales twofold. Both UHC and Esix claimed pure V.4 users were not interested in following Interactive down the Solaris route, and would prefer to stay with mainstream V.4 shops. Sun Microsystems Inc’s Solaris 2.0, due out in June, is seen by its three US competitors as a competent product for Sun Sparc systems, but they don’t see it making too many waves elsewhere. Esix’s Unix divisional manager, Jeff Hewitt said: it remains to be seen what Sun can actually do… it’s still a foreigner in the commercial business sector. Interactive’s position as Unix System Laboratories Inc’s principal publisher of V.4 fell by the wayside after the Sun deal, and, say the competitors, had no bearing on others’ ability to sell their products. That was a lot of market fluff that never got off the ground, said Hewitt. Unix Labs said that it had no plans to appoint any new principal publishers.
