I`ve just learned that Viscorp has lost the deal to get the rights to the Amiga. It is said that they failed to pay Escom the amount they wanted and so it was cancelled.

I have also heard that several companies are now in the running to buy the Amiga rights. There may be good news as this could mean that licenses could be easily got. Remember that all of this has not been confirmed.

Of course I put this to Viscorp but they just sent me some policy statement. This could mean that they won`t denie that they are no longer in the running for the rights of the Amiga as they don`t make it clear that they will be buying it. See what you make of their statement below. If you read it carefully you will notice that they say nothing about making a new Amiga computer but instead say about their Interactive TV thing.

VIScorp announced today that while conducting its due diligence for the planned acquisition of the assets of the former Amiga Technologies AG, its financial institutions and the management of Amiga agreed that the assets to be acquired were of significantly less value than the US$20 million which had been proposed. The original US$40 million offer included the guarantee of ESCOM distribution in Europe as well as several other features which disappeared with the ESCOM bankruptcy.

One of these items is the fact that one of the most valuable pieces of the inventory is currently encumbered in a complicated legal challenge to the ESCOM AG bankruptcy estate. Without the assurance that this piece could be delivered as a part of the package deal, VIScorp began to reconsider their offer.

Further, it has been discovered that the intellectual property is being pirated daily by small and large companies alike. To combat this problem, VIScorp intends to partner with Mahr Leonard Management Company, a Dallas, Texas company specializing in patent infringement.

Due to the above, VIScorp allowed its offer to expire on October 2, 1996, and lowered its bid shortly thereafter. Throughout all of this time a wholly-owned VIScorp German subsidiary continued to operate Amiga through Oct. 31, at its own expense and with the concurrence of the Trustee. This was done because VIScorp believed that Amiga was more valuable as an operating company and wanted it to retain this value. During this period VIScorp paid Amiga expenses, including salaries, and generated over $2 million in sales which were to be credited against the final sale price at a later date.

VIScorp continues to be interested in completing the acquisition of Amiga. It believes that the future of two-way, interactive television depends in large part on the installed base of Amiga users who currently access the Internet through their televisions and Amiga A1200 computers to reach thousands of available Amiga titles. It also believes the next step is to modify the operating system to further adapt the television market to the vast and developing resources being created by the Amiga world-wide development community - products which include games, entertainment, and information.

Anyway, I will be investigating more to find out the truth.

E-mail - philip mailman.dnet.co.uk

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