AvantGo, Socket, Odyssey Software say bye to one

[Andy Sjostrom]

In 1999 I attended a Windows CE / Pocket PC conference at Microsoft Campus, Redmond. The invited conference attendees were book authors, system integrators, and OEMs. The primary focus was the Pocket PC platform that was about to be launched in the coming months. Some speakers were Microsoft Program Managers while some were Microsoft partners. I still remember that I jotted down in my notepad:<br />"Stocks to watch:<br />AvantGo<br />Socket Communications<br />Odyssey Software"<br /><br />I was impressed with how these companies viewed the mobile world: not always online, both offline and online, connectivity between mobile phones and PDAs, reliable middleware between device and corporate infrastructure. I think back at that list when reading the article <a href="http://computerworld.com/mobiletopics/mobile/story/0,10801,74168,00.html">"AvantGo CEO quits as company is delisted"</a> that says: "AvantGo Inc. Chairman and CEO Richard Owen announced his resignation Tuesday, as shares of the struggling mobile software maker were booted from the Nasdaq Stock Market Inc.'s exchange for failing to meet Nasdaq's minimum price requirements."<br /><br />AvantGo, AvantGo! What have you done? What started out very nicely, has come to a very troublesome halt. Personally, I believe AvantGo has failed in finding the balance between consumer and Enterprise. They charge Enterprise $ for consumer content, and bring consumer technology to the Enterprise. I suggest getting back to basics: consumer $ for consumer content, and Enterprise technology for Enterprise.<br /><br />Socket Communications and Odyssey Software are both doing very well, which they deserve. Two out of three is ok, don't you think?

[Paragon]

So, Andy, how much did you loose on Avantgo stock? :) Or, I guess since the cup is two thirds full how much have you made off Socket, and, and Odyssey? :)

Dave

[Andy Sjostrom]

I said "watch"! :lol:

[Paragon]

I said "watch"! :lol:

Unfortunately that is all I ever do is watch

Dave

[Smakz]

Don't know why anyone would use Avantgo when you can put your site's feed up as RSS with the hundreds of readers out there.

[pradike]

:cry:
I loved Avantgo when I got the first of my 3 WINCE Pdas to date. The primary benefit was a way to assemble offline content for reading - primarily news and select WEB site content.

When they started to change a few years ago, and also restrict content significantly, I left in favor of Mazingo, which offers the bulk of the same services. Apparetnly many others did as well. Eventually, I think Mazingo passed up Avantgo in quality & content after a shakey start.

My concern is that Mazingo is going down the same lowly road as Avantgo, in assuming there is a market for users who will pay mostly for "common news" data. Not so. Almost every common news service that has started to charge for these kinds of services has failed. If users want to pay for multimedia stuff - that seems reasonable as a "hobby fee".

Its one thing to have a WEB site (like this one) which shares useful and entertaining information about a common subject, and another to regergitate news found a dozen other places on the WEB and try to charge for it.

Avantgo missed the boat - convenience has a limited value, and when they started to see $$$ in their eyes, they lost out. Enterprise users can't justify the added cost for only limited value (according to insiders at Avangto, the enterprise side had a small number of large volume users, and a small number of small volume users that made up the "portfolio").

While it is sad to see good people like Avantgo "sink", maybe next time they won't shoot themselves in the foot (or bottom of the boat) with a faulty busines model (HEAR THAT MAZINGO!).

I recall the builders of the Titanic said it was "unsinkable" too.

RIP Avantgo. You meant well.

[Marcel_Proust]

Don't know why anyone would use Avantgo when you can put your site's feed up as RSS with the hundreds of readers out there.
could you explain more re rss?
thanks.

[AZMark]

Unfortunatly AvantGo got into business when the INet craze was in full swing. Which means they had a business model guarenteed not to make money. That they have lasted this long shows that they were able to adapt through the most volitile business climate in recient history, and that they had some pretty good technology.

Mazingo, just took what they saw AvantGo doing and tweaked it a bit and tried to make a little money, but no real innovation there.

[ChrisD]

The slide of Avantgo down this road has been something I expected for awhile. Their corporate pricing structure (about $500 per client!) are way too high. Their proxy based design with free consumer access is eating their capital up since they have to handle all the requests from everyone through their servers! So I believe that Avantgo would have to charge consumers for their service to survive.

Just about a year ago, I convinced Bill Dettering at Applian to create Mazingo to meet users demands for channel based content. I convinced Bill that having a pointer that is stored locally on the PC that points to the data to download would offer what consumers wanted. This worked because there is no high overhead costs of being able to handle every single request for every html page and picture. Instead Mazingo has a server which allows users to select channels and then have their PC request the updates directly. This design allows Mazingo to scale their service to meet users demands as their appetites for content grows. This has been shown with their ability to handle distribution of audio and video which are much larger file sizes. Further it also allows for subscription based services that are just now taking off!


After explaining the differences in architecture of the design, it is clear to me that Avantgo's design costs more and does not offer as good a benefit to consumers as Mazingo does. So I believe that Mazingo will be around long after Avantgo.

BTW, before everyone flames me here about Mazingo and my role in creating it, I want to clarify that I do not have any financial stake in Mazingo. Yes, it was my idea but I did not have the resources to make it work so I gave it to someone that was able to do so. I did not recieve any compensation from Applian or Mazingo for this idea.

[Take1]

I agree that the Mazingo model is much more cost effective than AvantGo's gateway approach. I use both AvantGo and Mazingo on my PPC and I found Handstory (i.e., Mazingo-esque program) for my NR-70.

I'm already preparing for the demise of AvantGo and am glad that alternatives are available! Hopefully content providers like New York Times, CNET, and Afterdawn.com will open up their 'secret' AvantGo pages to permit other programs to sync with them.

[fireflyrsmr]

ok - now that it's dead how do i eliminate it from a pc 2002 machine (ipaq 3600)? i went to the remove programs list and it wasn't there! 8O

[Jason Dunn]

ok - now that it's dead how do i eliminate it from a pc 2002 machine (ipaq 3600)? i went to the remove programs list and it wasn't there! 8O

It's in ROM, so you can't remove it - but it's not taking up any space that you can use for anything else anyway, so don't worry about it. :-)

[fireflyrsmr]

Thanks jason.