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- LETTER FROM SOMEONE WHO SEEMS TO KNOW
- from Rick Balkins
- (aka Wildstar128@yahoo.com)
-
- [NOTE:] Rick responded on Homestead
- Maillist to some of my ranting and
- raving. --DMM
-
-
- Hello Rev. Dave,
-
- I will have to say that I have
- talked with Tulip/2L International. I
- also have talked with Ironstone
- Partners as well. I have talked with
- them and none of them has any
- intentions to shut down Commodore fan
- sites and sites supporting Commodore.
- Though they will defend the trademarks
- they own (or have license to in the
- case of Ironstone Partners).
-
- To get you up to date, Ironstone
- Partners will be in charge of
- production of Commodore branded
- products for the Commodore 8-bits. Due
- to a non-competition agreement,
- Tulip/2L International will not be
- "directly" producing products for the
- Commodore 8-bits. Now, to make so e
- clarification about how Tulip will be
- operating the "Commodore" brand: Tulip
- will be channeling the Commodore brand
- through their subsidiary 2L
- International as Commodore is a
- consumer brand and 2L International is
- the part of Tulip developing consumer
- branded products. Get me so far ?
-
- Let's now take a look at Tulip's
- history in a nutshell.
-
- Tulip was a company founded back
- in the mid to late 1980s which was
- traditionally a company who's market
- is "Business to Business" (B2B)
- marketing. In short, Tulip has been a
- company which produced computer
- products to business and education
- sector (as explained to me by Harro
- Tillema of 2L International who worked
- for the parent company Tulip until the
- beginning of the year and now is at 2L
- International).
-
- Tulip had no consumer brand market
- until they formed 2L International and
- acquired the international rights of
- Commodore from ESCOM after Gateway
- acquired the AMIGA rights from ESCOM.
-
- It was not until around 1997 that
- Tulip entered the consumer market.
- Harro used to be in charge of the
- press releases of Tulip until the
- beginning of this year when he
- transferred over to 2L International.
- He did see the press release before it
- was posted and noted to the Tulip
- Press Release department the parts
- that would cause concern and warned
- them of it. Well, it happened exactly
- like he expected when they posted it
- anyway. Guess the guy who wrote the
- press release got an important lesson.
- Harro Tillema gave them warning about
- possible responses.
-
- Now to give you an idea of who
- Harro Tillema is, other then a main
- individual at 2L International /
- Tulip. He is a Commodore users and is
- a member of the HCC Commodore User's
- Group in the Netherlands. He also
- seems to be a very nice fellow and
- gave me plenty of clarifications. He
- also liked my comments which drew upon
- many good points as well as voicing
- concerns in a way so they can work
- things out.
-
- Remember, Commodore wasn't really
- that much different from Tulip/2L
- International. They both a
- corporations. The company does consist
- of former employees of Commodore from
- the European sector. I hope this helps
- you to understand the company a little
- more.
-
- Ironstone Partners is a company
- which does consist of a fellow
- Commodore coder from the 1980s, Darren
- Melbourne who knows Commodore. This
- has relieved many of my concerns that
- this was a corporate entity which has
- no connection with Commodore in any
- sense.
-
- Rick Balkins
- wildstar128@yahoo.com
-
-
-