Re: Ada vendors and the art of selling used cars

[Reivilo Snuved <odevuns@iname.JUNK.com>]

"McDoobie" <chris@dont.spam.me> writes:
[snip]
> 
> I'm checking around for a good Ada development environment, and I wouldnt
> mind picking up a copy of GNAT Pro or the Aonix toolchain. But "contact
> our sales rep" is irritating as hell.

NOTE : I am posting this message on behalf of Greg Gicca, Director of Product 
       Management with Aonix (his newsserver is currently down) 

Chris,

We at Aonix have specific published prices and discount policies that
can not be varied from by a sales person or other employee without
approval from a VP or higher.  We do not publish prices due to legal
and country reasons.  The legal aspects tend to be that any price
published is only valid when published and can change at any time.
Thus publishing it in a public forum puts out prices that could be
misleading.  Also a price for a particular country may have
adjustments due to shipping or other concerns.  Secondly our prices
for a particular currency are based on the exchange rate at the time
of sale (quote).  Our fixed price schedule is based on US dollars (we
have to pick one currency).  The daily price in French Francs, or even
the Euro will vary.

When Aonix produces a quote for a particular product or set of
products it is very common for the purchasing agency to ask for the
relevant pages from our product catalog that list these prices, and
discount policies.  We can not vary from the prices or policies as
stated above.  We in fact "never" want to be the position of having
one representative quote a different price from another company
representative, regardless of geographic region or country location
(taking into account specific country differences, currency, etc.)

Any price quote you thus receive from Aonix from one individual will
be the same quote you would get from any other.  Used car type pricing
tactics are against our (and most other) Ada company policies.  If you
ask us for a price for a product it will be that published in our
product catalog.  If you ask for discount policies it will also be
that published in the product catalog and will clearly show that a
larger quantity purchase would save money on per product costs.

The one exception to our publishing prices is the ObjectAda Special
Edition product.  It is published as being for free as a download from
or web site, at:

http://www.aonix.com


Sincerely,

Greg Gicca
Aonix
Director of Product Management

adamark@sd.aonix.no.spam.com

-- 
Olivier Devuns                         | Aonix: http://www.aonix.com