The German software producer Omega has through announcements in
recent months made no secret of its
desire to develop a new MacOS compatible operating
system with the name COS. However, as is well known, since the end=
of
November, Omega has been in financial difficulties and, as can be
read on the
web site of the firm, has been seeking a new investment partner. I=
n
a somewhat
'spongy' statement which gives no real concrete reasons, Omega has
stated that
the need for a new investor arises because 'our existing partner i=
s
growing
impatient'. We have carried out some research and uncovered some h=
ighly
interesting facts.
At the present time, the investment is handled by the company GUB
Unternehmensbeteiligungen AG, based in Schw=E4bisch Hall. As our
research has
thrown up, since Autumn 1997 there has been a new member sitting i=
n the
control department, Dr. Jochen Haink - a former top manager for
Microsoft
Germany who, according to the GUB Web site, is working as an advis=
or
to firms
and perhaps is today also in direct contact with Microsoft.
The fact is that since that point in time, Omega has had immense
problems and
at the same time has had to suspend work on the development of COS.
One is
tempted to speculate therefore whether Microsoft has been
influencing events
at Omega through its influence at GUB. On first sight, it seems
naturally
quite absurd that the industrial giant should have any intereset i=
n
removing
the face of Omega from the map. But several possible reasons sprin=
g
to mind:
In the first place Omega has announced that COS should also be abl=
e
to run on
the Intel-Platform - Microsoft could theoretically be wanting to
avoid direct
competetition in a particualr market area. In the second place it
has been
rumored by experts over and over again that Microsoft has consider=
able
problems in the blending of Windows 98 and Windows NT into one ope=
ration
system. Is it a possibility that Microsoft has an interesent in th=
e COS
program code? In the past, it was reported several times on the we=
b
site MacOS
Rumors, that Microsoft were rumored to have an alleged interest in
BeOS and in
Rhapsody. The third possibility is that Microsoft, with its
investment of 150
million US-dollars in Apple wants to protect against direct
competition from
COS in the MacOS market place. If COS in its planned form were
actually to
appear, it would in such a way open up many doors in the market fo=
r
Clone producers.
Manfred Schmitz, the managing director of Omega wasn't prepared to
confirm or
deny these rumors but said that various developers in the COS team
had been
made some enticing alternative job offers. Whether and how far
Microsoft has
the final influence over GUB or Omega itself remains a secret, but
the given
details present some interesting facts from which to draw
conclusions. Anyone
who has more information on this subject should send it to MacGadg=
et
by eMail.
Stefan Wunner
MacGadget - The German MacOS-Newssite at http://www.macgadget.de
--"The public wants what the public gets, but I don't want what society's got" - Paul Weller
<> tbyars@earthlink.net <>