American History 1988
Chapter 374 - 363: Impact

Chapter 374: Chapter 363: Impact

On the night of August 24, the normally closed CompUSA store on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue was brightly lit.

The store was packed with customers, some lining up even blocks away, and several long lines in the shopping mall hall moved slowly forward.

They weren’t scrambling for records, sneakers, or a celebrity’s autograph.

Indeed, these people were all scrambling to buy Microsoft’s latest operating system, Windows 95!

Many customers, upon securing their boxes, proudly displayed their trophies to the cameras.

A young man wearing a headscarf held up two copies of the system disks, laughing heartily.

Such scenes were not confined to Manhattan but occurred in department stores around the world.

$210 was not a small amount at the time, but that did not deter people’s enthusiasm for Windows 95.

The New York Times described the launch as "the most spectacular, craziest, and most expensive product launch in the history of the computer industry."

Microsoft had put out so many ads that even some households without computers joined the buying spree.

"Unless you hid under a bridge, rowed out to the middle of the sea, or tucked yourself under a sofa and covered your ears...

Once you were exposed to newspapers, radio, television, or computer retail stores, you would be surrounded by Windows 95 advertisements!"

This was The Washington Post’s most vivid description of Microsoft’s advertising campaign.

It was said that to ensure the popularity of Windows 95, Microsoft had ramped up its advertising spend to close to $300 million.

It’s no exaggeration to say that this must have set a record for the highest marketing expenditure in industry history.

Indeed, this investment proved worthwhile, as Windows 95 sold one million copies in just four days.

Its sales record was revolutionary, and this system also ushered in a new era of computing.

Plug and play, multimedia videos, and 100% graphical operations—these features even prompted many households without computers to consider buying one.

In a sense, Windows 95 genuinely improved the prevalence of computers in America.

Since Microsoft’s new operating system was so popular, how did its Plus add-on pack perform?

Objectively speaking, it was just mediocre, not exploding like the standard version of Windows 95, yet not entirely neglected.

But given the phenomenal response the standard version elicited, the Plus add-on pack’s mediocre sales performance could even be seen as a failure.

Ultimately, the applications included in the add-on pack were not what people generally needed.

For instance, Microsoft heavily promoted MSN, which did not gain the anticipated attention.

Internet users already had AOL and Yahoo, both of which were more established than MSN.

With better alternatives and established habits, there was no reason for users to switch their information channels to MSN.

As for the Navigator browser, placed second in the lineup, it barely made a splash.

"It’s completely a college student’s project—it doesn’t support video playback or plugin development.

Most importantly, it’s too buggy. It’s hard to believe this is Microsoft’s newest design for a browser; it feels more like an antique from years ago,"

That was the review from evaluators of the Navigator browser in the Plus add-on pack.

Clearly, for a browser, it couldn’t even meet the most basic user expectations.

Whether Microsoft was too confident with Windows 95, or knew its limitations is unknown.

The Navigator browser was not a focal point in Microsoft’s marketing, and Gates only mentioned it briefly during the launch.

Netscape, however, wasn’t about to second-guess their intentions, just one week after Windows 95 was released.

CEO Barksdale formally announced to the media that Netscape’s Explorer 3.0 would be free for everyone!

It would no longer differentiate between regular and business users—anyone could download and use the Explorer 3.0 browser for free.

Once this news was announced, it captured intense national media attention.

The browser had become an indispensable tool for internet users, known to nearly all of them.

Now, Netscape, which held over 90% of the market share, announced that their latest generation browser would be free.

For consumers, this naturally was good news, and the majority of the media praised this decision.

Of course, some speculated that this was a strategic move by Netscape in response to Microsoft’s competition.

However, this argument didn’t gain much traction because Microsoft’s browser performance was so poor, it posed no threat to Netscape.

Regardless, the ultimate beneficiaries were the consumers.

And for this reason, the media praised Netscape, both explicitly and implicitly.

However, while the general public was jubilant, Wall Street had a different reaction.

Right after Netscape’s announcement, its stock price fell nearly 10% that very day.

The price, which was close to $58, took a notable hit.

Well, people like Clark, who had seen their wealth skyrocket from Netscape’s IPO, finally felt the sting.

After all, a one percent fluctuation represented tens of millions of dollars vanishing.

But this was something they had already anticipated, and the stock market decline was within expectations.

"Dean, should we release some positive news now?

If this continues, I’m afraid the staff will be too demoralized to work, as they’re all focused on the stocks."

Unable to hold back any longer, Clark finally approached Dean three days later.

There was no helping it, as Netscape’s stock had been falling for several days, with a total decline of 20%.

This kind of pain felt like a deep cut to anyone, especially to the employees holding Netscape stock options.

They were worried that if it continued to fall, Netscape’s stock might break.

That would indeed be a colossal joke, especially since they had only been listed for less than two months.

This was certainly an exaggerated statement, as the financial team had analyzed it long ago, and 20% was likely the bottom line for the decline.

Because the licensing fees for the browser constituted less than one-third of Netscape’s total revenue.

Even if this segment of business went directly to zero, it would not cause the stock price to shrink by one-third of its value.

After all, a free browser was expanding Netscape’s user base.

In the long term, the revenue generated from its network certificate authorization and plug-in services was bound to grow.

Because the plate was larger, the number of businesses willing to pay would naturally increase as well.

So a 20% drop had already seen its bottom, Wall Street analysts were not fools, the internet trend was established.

Everyone knew it already represented the future development trend, being bullish was inevitable.

Dean even suspected that the recent fluctuations in Netscape stock were due to some capitals shorting it.

Otherwise, it should not have fallen so quickly, given that the market overall was optimistic about Netscape’s future development.

But considering the employees’ sentiments and giving confidence to the market, Dean still accepted Clark’s suggestion.

"Let’s bring forward our financial report, the payment rate for our email service has already exceeded 8%.

And the bidding revenue from the browser’s homepage each quarter, I believe these figures will inform Wall Street how to act."

Originally, according to the plans, Netscape was to announce the latest financial report at the end of September.

Now, in order to stabilize the stock price, the only choice was to bring it forward.

The revenue from the email service and homepage bidding was perfectly capable of compensating for the original licensing fees of the browser.

"I’ll get someone to contact the reporters right away," Clark said excitedly, ready to rush out, but Dean stopped him.

"Wait a moment, any time is fine to seek reporters. But what about Microsoft? They haven’t shown any reaction?"

A week had almost passed since Netscape announced the free browser policy.

But to Dean’s surprise, everything was calm at Microsoft’s end. Could it be that their assumptions were off and Microsoft didn’t care about the browser business?

"Perhaps Seattle has surrendered already," Clark shrugged. "I tried their Navigator, I couldn’t even load my own email."

After just a few minutes of trying, Clark confidently closed Microsoft’s Navigator browser.

The newspapers were correct; it was merely a college student’s side project.

"Gates doesn’t seem like the type to surrender easily," Dean frowned slightly. "They also have enough strength to support a competition with Netscape."

"Who knows?" Clark was no longer taking Microsoft too seriously, at least for now.

"Keep a close eye on their movements, and inform me of any news immediately."

Dean had limited energy; besides Netscape, he also needed to focus on Bitnet, Yahoo, the Price list, and more businesses.

"By the way, it’s time for our Explorer 3.0 to be launched; it’s the second gift prepared for Microsoft."

The popularity of Windows95 had slightly waned, now was the perfect moment for Netscape to enter the scene.

"We’ve been ready for everything," Clark winked at Dean, keeping a close watch on this matter.

"Good," Dean gestured for him to go ahead, now it was time to see Microsoft’s response.

Beep beep beep... The phone ringtone disrupted Dean’s thoughts.

"Hillary?" Dean answered the call, raising an eyebrow in surprise.

"Dean, what’s happening with Netscape? Its stock has been falling these past few days."

As the First Lady, Hillary’s attention now extended beyond politics to include Netscape as well.

"It’s just some business adjustments, it will return to normal levels soon," Dean explained patiently.

"I heard that you have made your products free, that’s a crazy decision, Dean," Hillary was extremely anxious about this.

Her advisors had told her that the Netscape stock she and Clinton held had shrunk by nearly 100 million US dollars.

God! When she heard this news, Hillary almost knocked over a vase in front of the reporters.

As soon as she had some free time, she called Dean.

"Hillary, listen, we did this to strangle our potential competitors in the cradle.

If we want to amass more wealth, we must operate like this; we need more of the market!"

Explaining business decisions to politicians was troublesome, and Dean did not enjoy doing it.

"I was just..." Hillary paused for a moment, "I just wanted to confirm what happened."

She noticed that Dean was gradually losing patience, but this concerned her fortune.

No one could ignore the disappearance of 100 million US dollars, especially Hillary who loved wealth dearly.

"Trust me, Hillary, Netscape’s stock will soon recover to normal, I promise."

"Really?" Dean’s past credibility, allowed Hillary to relax significantly inside.

"Of course, business is my expertise."

"Dean, I trust you, your words always reassure me."

Compared to a politician’s pledges, Hillary preferred to trust Dean’s guarantees.

"Don’t worry, in at most two weeks, the weather will clear up.

However, I have a feeling that we might face a strong competitor," Dean subtly prepared her.

"A strong competitor? Who? If you need help..."

"No, not for now. As long as we play by the rules, Netscape doesn’t fear competition."

Dean always acted reasonably, but some people might resort to thuggish behaviors.

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.