Tracy Romine Interviews Jeff McNaught

CNET Radio Interview Transcript

Transcript Date: May 09, 2001
Time: 02:30 PM - 03:00 PM
Station: CNET Radio
Location: Network

Tracy Romine, host: Well, one of the big stories today--stage two power alerts. Here we are in California looking at a possible stage three. It was about this time yesterday that the stage three was issued. We've not gotten the bad news just yet that that's taking place, but it could happen at anytime. After all, the folks that were studying demand and supply say that today would be a mirror of yesterday. And it might be that some folks are going to have to do without power for awhile. It's right up that alley that I interview our next guest, Jeff McNaught, of Wyse Technology, W-Y-S-E, talking about how much power PCs use,and Wyse has a solution. Jeff, thanks for coming on today.

Jeff McNaught (Wyse Technology): Hey, thanks for having me.

Romine: I understand now that the average computer uses something like forty-five watts of power, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, a figure that does not include the power required for a separate monitor.

McNaught: That's right.

Romine: And there are options out there though, huh?

McNaught: Well, you know, in fact, that's, that's a good point. The average new PC in stand-by mode uses about twenty--forty-five watts of power, but on average PCs are using around two hundred in the field today, because most people don't have only the latest PCs on their desk.

Romine: So that's, that's grinding away a lot of power.

McNaught: Oh, is it ever. I mean absolutely true.

Romine: And what does Wyse have in its hands that might be one thing for us to consider?

McNaught: Well, Wyse has been building this technology called Thin Clients for the last couple of years and they are starting to really take hold. They got some kind of false start several years ago with things like the network computer and such that we heard from Larry Ellison. But the Thin Clients, such as Wyse's Winterm, Thin Clients are PC-alternative desktop appliances that have, you know, the look, the feel, the functionality of a Windows PC, except all of the computing is done on back-end servers. And so, you see, these devices will reduce a business's cost of ownership for their desktop devices and in the past year they really, I think, have presented an even more timely value proposition for California business's with our, with our power crunch here.

Romine: Now, we're talking about, is this a lot like the web appliances that we've seen released by different companies?

McNaught: It is, but it's a much more industrial strength version of a web appliance because, where a web appliance is just trying to bring you the internet, what a Thin Clients, or Thin Appliance is doing in our stage, is it's bringing you that whole PC experience. But, instead of your applications running on your local hard drive and CTU, they're running on a server that's well protected. So you get all the applications, all the color, all the robustness, but you get a lot less complexity of the desktop. So these devices are much, much easier.

Romine: If I'm not mistaken, I think, I think Wyse Technologies may have had a lot of testing in hotels. Isn't that one place where you guys have inked a lot contracts?

McNaught: Yeah, there's--if you go to Las Vegas – 09/05/2001 - Wyse Winterm uses about seven to ten watts of power per hour and that's the equivalent, if you will, of a Christmas tree light bulb, or a night light in your home.

Romine: I guess the one big question--yeah, we'd all like to help with the energy problem here in California as long as we didn't have to give up a lot. I mean, we've become very accustomed to our high-speed Net access, to the quick access to applications and being able to save things. You know, we're in the fast food generation. We want things now and we want it--no, we want it yesterday, actually. Does--what do we have to give up in order to use a Thin Client device that's relying on a server out there somewhere, as opposed to everything being in the box on my desk?

McNaught: Well, a whole lot less than you'd expect actually and what most people think. In most cases that server is on your local area network. It just probably is in your clean room, if you will. And what you find is that people are putting Quad Xeon in larger boxes as the server to these devices, so with the efficiencies of Windows 2000, which is really what's running on the server--and we're using the terminal service's functionality of Windows 2000--applications like Excel and PowerPoint and such actually load faster and, in many cases, execute faster than they would on a PC, which is one of those things that you kind of don't believe until you actually see it.

Romine: Compare costs for if I wanted to fill up an office with PCs, you know--the latest things from HP, or versus the Wyse Technology Thin Client device. Would it be comparable, would I be making out like a bandit with Wyse, or paying a little more?

McNaught: Well, I think, actually, you'd find that you pay a lot less if you look at just comparing the personal computer itself to the Thin Client. You know, PCs run everywhere from, I guess, five hundred dollars for the lowest end device to about fifteen hundred kind of on average. But a Thin Client such as what we sell on a desk-by-desk basis could be had for--oh gosh, as low as three fifty-nine for a complete desktop. And that, of course, goes up with capability. And then you have the conserver cost, but when companies like Gardner and IDC and Zona have looked at these numbers and said let's just compare servers and Thin Clients versus PC and conservers, they find in some cases that you save between thirty-five to fifty-seven percent of your budget using Thin Client. I mean, it's a big, big benefit. And with energy savings now, that number grows.

Romine: Hey, let me ask you this. We're talking to Jeff McNaught of Wyse Technologies. Why do you think--I know Wyse is doing well--why do you--where do you think a lot of these web appliance marketers and the makers of web appliances--where did they go wrong? We've seen so many of them have a difficult time. Three.com from Audrey, The Audrey, from Three.com, just thrown in the dust bin. A lot of these companies, were they just taking the wrong approach on who to pitch this to?

McNaught: Well, you know, I think it's a combination of things. One of the problems that I've seen be the most glaring is that these companies have simply underestimated the capabilities that a consumer desires in using the web. You remember a product called Eye Opener, right? And when we looked at our Eye Openers and started to hit sites that were common for consumers--things like Lego.com, where the kids would go--most of the content couldn't come up because these web appliances, in many cases, don't have the plug-in support to deliver the kinds of media that people expect today. And that's been the biggest problem. It's so hard to cram all of that capability into a device that's ultimately supposed to sell for, you know, very, very small amounts of money.

Romine: Is this something that I would want to use in my home? Or, is this largely something that I'd need a LAN--and probably, in the corporate world--to get the benefit of.

McNaught: Well, for a Thin Client, you're typically going to put that--you could put it in your home if you were a telecommuter, for instance. And you'd dial into the corporate LAN and get access into all those resources. There are new Thin Clients that have browsers that are as powerful as what you have on your PC, and you could easily use those at home connected to, you know, your DSL, or connected to your modem. But I think right now the real--the real growth in this market is in the commercial sector and a lot of companies, including Wyse, are looking at, okay, now how do we take those devices and move them into the home and have real value.

Romine: Good enough. Jeff McNaught, of Wyse Technologies, thanks for your time today.

McNaught: Hey, my pleasure Tracy.

Romine: It is W-Y-S-E, anybody getting on line to try and track them down. Wyse Technology.

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About Wyse Technology

Wyse is the #1 vendor the world's largest businesses and institutions trust for scalable thin-client computing solutions. Wyse provides the hardware, software, and services that shift computing complexity to the network, reducing cost, liberating IT departments from unnecessary support and maintenance functions, empowering users to be more productive in their jobs, and protecting and improving access to critical information and business applications. Headquartered in San Jose, California with offices worldwide, Wyse has been #1 in thin-client market share for the last eight years, enjoys a close partnership with Citrix Systems, and has been named Microsoft "Embedded Partner of the Year" for three years. Wyse customers include FedEx, Best Buy (Canada), Quaker Foods, and Gold's Gym.

For more information, visit the Wyse website at http://www.wyse.com or call 1-800-GET-WYSE