HP support is stepping up to enhance the 3000.

August 1998

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HP support is stepping up to enhance the 3000

HP support is stepping up to enhance the 3000.The details remain to be worked out, but there’s a new ally for the HP 3000’s renaissance inside Hewlett-Packard this month — the customer support organization. Sure, support has always made sure that 3000 software and hardware remained reliable, and even got bug fixes out to the customer base. But according to CSY R&D manager Winston Prather and GM Harry Sterling, there’s been a fundamental shift in how support will help 3000 customers with new functionality. The change? The support organization will fund some enhancements for HP 3000s in places like Posix smoothing, for example.

The shift is especially important while CSY is working to bring the HP 3000 and MPE/iX to IA-64 systems, and let it use a lot more of the PA-RISC power in the 8500 and 8700 chips. This is work that is taxing CSY to the point that the smaller items are sliding to bottom of lists. Support funding for selected enhancements will help do the everyday tactical work while CSY funds the strategic growth solutions.

While everyone assumes their support dollars go for enhancements, these improvements to existing products — like MPE/iX, for example — simply aren’t funded that way. Support dollars go to fix bugs and run the Response Centers, while things like multiple job queues must be paid for out of the 3000 division’s budget. Now some of the funding will come from the support organization, to help pay for what HP has begun to call Customer Funded Enhancements, or CFEs. The CFEs began their life as a way to get CSY to do the things it couldn’t make a good business case for, but were nevertheless on some customers’ wish lists. When HP couldn’t give a green light to a business plan for an enhancement, letting the customer base fund the CSY development was supposed to be another way to daylight.

There was fundamental resistance inside CSY to making customers pay for such extras, however. With the new support funding, CFEs are getting more real. “There’s a list beginning to be made of CFEs,” Prather told us at HP World. Getting an enhancement designated as a CFE is one way to pay for product improvements, “another avenue for items that don’t come out of our business planning,” said CSY engineer Pam Bennett. “The CFE will be supporting more of the items that come out of customer delight or SIG list items that might help replace some of our resources that have been shifted to more long-term items.”

“What we didn’t like about it was that we don’t think customers should have to pay additional money [for enhancements],” Prather said. “I didn’t feel good about that. The progress that we’ve made is that the support organization said, ‘You’re right, we’re not asking for more money — and we’re going to fund some of these enhancements.’ ” Now that comes from the fellow responsible for budgeting the development work which only CSY can do, in many cases — so we expect he’s got pretty much the last word on what support will be doing for the HP 3000. “I don’t think people [at HP World] understood the significance,” Prather added. “That’s an agreement we’ve reached with the support organization to selectively fund enhancements, almost like Customer Delight Solutions. CSY is looking out for the long run, the big ticket items and strategic investments we need to do to make sure the platform moves forward. This is another way to get that kind of thing funded. The support organization has said they will use support dollars to enhance the product.” One place the support money could make a lot of difference is in compilers. And CSY said it was taking back ownership of some key 3000 compilers from the software support group.
Copyright 1998 The 3000 NewsWire. All rights reserved




		Click here for WRQ sponsor message
		HP support is stepping up to enhance the 3000 HP support is stepping up to enhance the 3000.The details remain to be worked out, but there’s a new ally for the HP 3000’s renaissance inside Hewlett-Packard this month — the customer support organization. Sure, support has always made sure that 3000 software and hardware remained reliable, and even got bug fixes out to the customer base. But according to CSY R&D manager Winston Prather and GM Harry Sterling, there’s been a fundamental shift in how support will help 3000 customers with new functionality. The change? The support organization will fund some enhancements for HP 3000s in places like Posix smoothing, for example. The shift is especially important while CSY is working to bring the HP 3000 and MPE/iX to IA-64 systems, and let it use a lot more of the PA-RISC power in the 8500 and 8700 chips. This is work that is taxing CSY to the point that the smaller items are sliding to bottom of lists. Support funding for selected enhancements will help do the everyday tactical work while CSY funds the strategic growth solutions. While everyone assumes their support dollars go for enhancements, these improvements to existing products — like MPE/iX, for example — simply aren’t funded that way. Support dollars go to fix bugs and run the Response Centers, while things like multiple job queues must be paid for out of the 3000 division’s budget. Now some of the funding will come from the support organization, to help pay for what HP has begun to call Customer Funded Enhancements, or CFEs. The CFEs began their life as a way to get CSY to do the things it couldn’t make a good business case for, but were nevertheless on some customers’ wish lists. When HP couldn’t give a green light to a business plan for an enhancement, letting the customer base fund the CSY development was supposed to be another way to daylight. There was fundamental resistance inside CSY to making customers pay for such extras, however. With the new support funding, CFEs are getting more real. “There’s a list beginning to be made of CFEs,” Prather told us at HP World. Getting an enhancement designated as a CFE is one way to pay for product improvements, “another avenue for items that don’t come out of our business planning,” said CSY engineer Pam Bennett. “The CFE will be supporting more of the items that come out of customer delight or SIG list items that might help replace some of our resources that have been shifted to more long-term items.” “What we didn’t like about it was that we don’t think customers should have to pay additional money [for enhancements],” Prather said. “I didn’t feel good about that. The progress that we’ve made is that the support organization said, ‘You’re right, we’re not asking for more money — and we’re going to fund some of these enhancements.’ ” Now that comes from the fellow responsible for budgeting the development work which only CSY can do, in many cases — so we expect he’s got pretty much the last word on what support will be doing for the HP 3000. “I don’t think people [at HP World] understood the significance,” Prather added. “That’s an agreement we’ve reached with the support organization to selectively fund enhancements, almost like Customer Delight Solutions. CSY is looking out for the long run, the big ticket items and strategic investments we need to do to make sure the platform moves forward. This is another way to get that kind of thing funded. The support organization has said they will use support dollars to enhance the product.” One place the support money could make a lot of difference is in compilers. And CSY said it was taking back ownership of some key 3000 compilers from the software support group. Copyright 1998 The 3000 NewsWire. All rights reserved