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Fast400 Bites the Dust
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FAST400 Bites the Dust
iSeries Network, November 17,2005
Fast400's
long and contentious battle of wills with IBM —which recently climaxed
in a lawsuit brought by FAST400
cofounder Jim Stracka against Big Blue — has died with barely a whimper.
A note posted on the FAST400 home page yesterday
states simply that the lawsuit has been resolved to everyone's
satisfaction, and, as a result, FAST400 will no
longer be sold or distributed.
FAST400 has raised IBM's hackles since it was first introduced because
it gives customers a way to bypass the
iSeries' CFINT 5250 "governor" and therefore avoid paying IBM's much
reviled interactive tax. Most recently, IBM
announced plans to restrict systemstate programs in a future version of
i5/OS, thereby potentially derailing
FAST400 for good.
Stracka says the lawsuit was settled out of court before its scheduled
court date last month. The terms of the lawsuit
prevent him from discussing the matter, but he says he's "happy it's
over and happy to move on to other projects."
Whether any of those projects might involve the iSeries remains to be
seen. Stracka says that, with his
involvement in the former PentaSafe and in FAST400, he knows the iSeries
market pretty well, but his current
projects are in a different area. Although his relationship with IBM was
an "arm's length relationship" at PentaSafe
and a highly contentious one with FAST400, he thinks he and Big Blue
could get along well enough if he finds a
project that's equally beneficial to both.
Exactly how benefinical his outofcourt settlement might have been — or
whether it was beneficial at all — he's not
at liberty to say. In 2002, Stracka offered to sell IBM the rights to
FAST400 for $25 million. According to Stracka's
suit, that offer led to a negotiation table in a Houston hotel room
where federal officers broke in and whisked Stracka
off to jail charged with extortion — charges that were later dropped. A
quiet resolution to Stracka's lawsuit might
seem to indicate that IBM finally decided to buy off its old nemesis
rather than continue the battle in court. "People
are going to assume what they're going to assume," Stracka says.
So what does all this mean for FAST400 customers? Stracka says the
company is dedicated to supporting current customers until their
currrent service contracts run out. After that time, those contracts
won't be renewed.
Customers' needing support should contact FAST400 creator Leif Svalgaard
at support@fast400.com. |
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