American History 1988
Chapter 276 - 267: Bayonet Fight

Chapter 276: Chapter 267: Bayonet Fight

Just after Intuit released the latest version of Quicken, Microsoft was quick to act as well.

To quickly launch the third version of Microsoft Money, Gates doubled the original project team’s size.

A team of over six hundred people dedicated their full efforts to perfecting Microsoft Money, a configuration so luxurious it was unparalleled.

Intuit, in its entirety, didn’t have that many people, counting even the most recently hired employees, it only totaled 425.

And that was split among several groups, each developing different software.

Compared to Microsoft’s ultra-luxurious team, they were modest to say the least.

Because they had enough hands, Microsoft managed to complete the third version of Microsoft Money in just four short months.

In the Velvet Factory of Seattle, Microsoft had tens of thousands of employees.

Pulling out a team of six hundred was not a difficult task.

This massive alien mothership finally revealed its ferocious side.

Once it was roused, few competitors could survive under such dense fire.

Microsoft was now ready to unload its ammunition, aiming at Intuit in Silicon Valley and Byte Company behind it.

"How far behind Quicken is our Microsoft Money now?"

Inside the office, Gates was personally trying out the new version of Microsoft Money, which he had made one of his major goals for the year.

"We don’t have online capabilities and the practice of linking accounts to bank accounts hasn’t spread to enough banks yet."

Steve, aware of Gates’s focus on this project, personally took charge of the promotion for Microsoft Money.

Thanks to the efforts of the team of over six hundred people, this financial management software had significantly improved in user experience compared to the previous version.

At least in Steve’s view, compared to the last version of Quicken, there wasn’t a visible gap.

But Microsoft had only recently entered the financial software field, and it didn’t have as much experience and knowledge in it yet.

So most of the time they could only follow Intuit and correspondingly add features to Microsoft Money.

For instance, this new version of Quicken greatly improved the design of online capabilities, and the number of banks partnering with Intuit had increased to 132.

In contrast, Microsoft didn’t even think about these features before the new Quicken was released.

Falling behind by following in another’s footsteps will always leave you steps behind.

Gates realized this as well, so he immediately adjusted the plan.

"Let’s update the online capabilities as soon as possible, and include at least the major banks in America. Most importantly, we need to recruit experienced developers in the financial software field."

To change the situation of Microsoft Money always being one step behind, solutions had to come from the root.

Clearly the fastest way was to poach talent from other companies, but which companies had these experienced developers?

Steve got the hint instantly; Intuit’s brand was beckoning him glaringly.

However, regarding the online capabilities, this touched on Microsoft’s Achilles’ heel.

"Bill, our servers are typically only used to support development work or to collect user feedback.

If we connect Microsoft Money to the servers, it might affect our everyday work."

Steve spoke diplomatically, knowing Microsoft’s servers had limited capacity.

Unlike a pure office software company like Byte Company, which needed a large number of servers to support the online communication needs of collaborative software,

Microsoft’s operating systems and Office suite didn’t require it; they were single-purchase software that could be used on a computer even without an internet connection.

So these products didn’t need server support from Microsoft. If not for their own developers needing it, Microsoft might not have even established a server center.

But if they planned to open it to the public, Seattle’s sole server center would likely collapse into a state of malfunction.

With Steve’s reminder, Gates too realized the problem.

Should he invest a fortune to establish server centers all across America just for Microsoft Money?

That obviously wouldn’t be worth the loss, and even an irrational Gates wouldn’t make that decision.

So after some consideration, he reluctantly gave up on the idea.

"Aside from the online capabilities, let’s perfect everything else as quickly as possible. But for now, aren’t we ready to promote Microsoft Money 3.0?"

"Of course," Steve passed him a well-designed package box.

Gates saw at first glance the prominently bold, large price figure on the box: 19.5 US dollars!

Yes, this was the price of Microsoft Money 3.0.

Compared to Quicken’s 60-70 US dollars, it was virtually a giveaway.

No, to be precise, it was a giveaway even when compared to Microsoft Money’s previous version priced at 39.5 US dollars.

To seize market share in financial software, Microsoft directly instigated a price war.

It was near impossible to find any on-market software sold at a lower price.

If it was to remain ever one step behind Intuit in terms of features, then it had to find an advantage in pricing.

Gates planned to crush Intuit with the rock-bottom price of 19.5 US dollars.

He believed that as long as the price was low enough, it would surely attract enough users.

Being a price butcher might be somewhat self-harming, but it was a simple and effective tactic.

...

"Has Microsoft gone mad? They won’t even see a return on their investment within two years!"

Cook waved his arms in agitation, the packaging box for Microsoft Money 3.0 also swaying from side to side in the air with his movements.

"It seems Gates has really put down huge capital this time." Dean too was surprised at Microsoft’s irrational pricing.

This wasn’t a price war anymore; it was practically dumping.

Dean finally witnessed the brutal side of competing with Microsoft—their aggressive tactics would likely lead to a quick defeat for most companies.

"Dean, will our ’shutdown plan’ really work?" Cook was now struggling to cope with Microsoft’s fierce strike.

Dean shrugged at him, "Do you have any better ideas? At least this will allow us to hold on to most of our users."

"Alright, I just hope Intuit doesn’t receive too many complaints." Cook felt somewhat uneasy doing this for the first time.

Facing Cook’s unease, Dean was somewhat disappointed. Was this all they had to worry about?

It was just a little trick, after all, and it didn’t affect the normal use of the software’s functions.

Cook had yet to see the various shenanigans of rogue software of later generations.

Considering this was America, Dean was already being very restrained.

...

Following closely after Quicken, Microsoft released Microsoft Money 3.0 in late June.

The release was much earlier than Dean and his team had anticipated, Microsoft’s efficiency surprisingly high under the conditions of saturated resources.

Moreover, to compete with Quicken in the ring, Microsoft had invested a hefty sum in advertising.

Television commercials, street posters, newspaper and magazine ads - none were lacking; within a week they had densely covered various media platforms.

The price of US$19.50 indeed attracted a lot of attention, as American families had bookkeeping needs too.

One only needed to look at the myriad of monthly bills—childcare, dining, mortgages, transport, daily necessities, entertainment, vacations...

Gather these bills together, and you’d likely have a thick stack.

Clearly, relying on one’s memory alone, it was hard for people to remember all the bills.

And once they missed an expense, they could face water and power cutoffs, or even their credit might be affected.

So, writing them down in a paper ledger was the practice for most families a few years ago.

Now with Quicken, people were gradually adapting to this kind of financial software that significantly simplified tedious financial work.

When originally promoting Quicken software, Cook had always focused on "ending financial hassles" as the core selling point.

The newest version’s features for distribution statistics and payment reminders became loved by users upon release.

Financial software was becoming more and more convenient, and with the recent half-year tussle between Intuit and Microsoft, it had entered the sight of more and more families.

Now with Microsoft setting the super-low price of US$19.50, it naturally swayed some people’s hearts.

After all, this price was more than three times cheaper than Quicken’s US$60, boasting an impressive cost-performance ratio.

Microsoft Money’s user experience isn’t great? No problem, because it’s cheap.

Frugal housewives began urging their husbands to purchase Microsoft Money to replace the relatively pricey Quicken.

Mike was one of the husbands driven out of his home; he went unwillingly, dragging his feet to the supermarket not far from the community.

Sally thought too simply about this matter; she had no idea how troublesome it was to transfer all of the previous years’ financial data to another software.

The complex steps were enough to baffle most people, one of the reasons behind Quicken users’ high stickiness.

After all, who would want to spend so much effort to transfer data once they got used to it?

Mike would rather continue using the relatively expensive Quicken than try the cheaper Microsoft Money.

Besides, the latter’s reviews were very average; everyone understands that you get what you pay for.

He had tried explaining to his wife, but Sally didn’t care about any of that. After all, it was Mike who would be dealing with the software, not her.

With no other choice, Mike ended up bringing home a copy of Microsoft Money 3.0; frankly, the price of US$19.50 was indeed cheap.

Out of curiosity, Mike wanted to see just how well this budget software would perform.

He turned on the computer, installed Microsoft Money, then opened Quicken.

To complete the transfer of the financial information from over the years, he had to first export the original data.

Or he could try opening both software simultaneously to see if there was a quick data migration feature between them.

Mike had some computing skills, his level better than most people’s.

Otherwise, Sally wouldn’t have entrusted this task to him; he had sorted out all the computer and network issues in their home.

After opening Quicken, Mike moved the cursor over the Microsoft Money icon, wanting to try the shortcut first.

Click-click, he double-clicked the mouse. Ding! Suddenly, a window popped up.

It wasn’t the Microsoft Money interface, but an error message.

"This software is in conflict with Quicken and has unknown security risks; cannot be opened concurrently?!"

Mike was stunned; this situation was unexpected.

He fetched the Microsoft Money software package and scrutinized it for a long time.

It surely wasn’t a pirated software; he was certain he hadn’t made a mistake in purchasing.

Determined, Mike clicked a few more times, but each attempt was met with the prompt alert.

"Ok~" Mike spread his hands in resignation, evidently the shortcut was a no-go.