Amdahl's latest mainframe is choked by parts shortage

Amdahl has been hit by a parts shortage for its newest mainframe, the 1000 series.

In December, the company announced Omniprise - since renamed the 1000 series - in response to IBM's similar Multiprise 3000 mainframe launched last September. The 1000 series is an OS/390-compatible mainframe aimed at smaller companies that want mainframes without the full cost and performance of the typical S/390 product.

An Amdahl spokesman admitted that parts are in short supply from Fujitsu and said he does not expect the situation to improve before June.

Sources close to Amdahl say that the company has only sold two models so far - one in Europe and one in the US.

The Amdahl spokesman did not deny this figure, but said that in the long run there is a good size market for the 1000 series among customers with ECL based mainframes that are 10 years old or more. This sector of the market has been an easy target market for Unix vendors.

"There is a big market out there to replace older technology ECL mainframes," said the spokesman. "You could replace those with a 1000 series and get your investment back on environmental cost savings alone. We believe we can sweep up a good part of this market once we have full supply."

Independent analyst Phil Paine noted that both IBM and Amdahl are dependent on parts refurbished from old mainframes for many of their products, particularly when there is a manufacturing problem.

"This at least shows that existing Amdahl mainframe customers aren't handing machines back," he said. "These products are useful from the point of view of inventory control, but Amdahl's salesforce would much rather sell the bigger machines than spend their time on these low-margin products."