IBM spurns Wintel version of Net PC

The first cracks in the Net PC facade appeared last week as IBM confirmed it will not make machines to conform to the Wintel-backed specification, because it is too expensive.

IBM, which demonstrated Net PC prototypes three months ago, stated that it did not see customer demand for the product.

The Net PC specification, driven by Intel, Microsoft, Compaq, Dell and Hewlett Packard, demands that machines do not include a floppy drive as a matter of security.

An IBM PC Company representative said: ?IBM buys in excess of four million floppy drives a year, so one only costs us about $14. Our concern as an organisation is that we?re being asked to conform to a specification which is not really cheap.?

James Griffiths, senior product manager of commercial desktops at Compaq, said: ?From the outset, IBM was not committed to it [the Net PC] and it introduced an NC. We?re heavily committed to the Net PC.

?The reality of NCs is that they?re closer to $1,000 than the original $500 suggested by [Oracle CEO ]Larry Ellison. You?re then talking about the same price as a Net PC but it?s a different technology.?

Richard Chapman, UK marketing manager at the IBM PC Company, denied suggestions that the manufacturer would pull out of the Net PC market entirely.

?We are still seriously looking at the Net PC as something we want to do, but it won?t be imminent,? he said.

At the same time, Forrester Research published results of a survey indicating that the total cost of ownership on the desktop was not a buying consideration for 78 per cent of Fortune 1,000 companies for Net PCs.