This is from ThinkSecret.com ...


Lay-offs hit FileMaker development team
---------------------------------------
Restructuring efforts at FileMaker, Inc. have led to
the elimination of several development positions
within the company, sources inform Think Secret. While
specific numbers differ among sources, insiders
suggest that up to 13 developers, or one-third of
FileMaker's development team, were axed in recent
weeks.

The lay-offs are said to be partially related to the
departure of FileMaker Vice President Chung Le, who
previously headed product development at the company.
While Think Secret's initial report regarding Le's
departure quoted a FileMaker spokesperson as saying
Le left on his own accord, several individuals with
close ties to the company have since come forward to
report that Le was essentially forced out, in part due
to problems surrounding the release of FileMaker Pro 7,
as well as political struggles within the company.
Similar shake-ups have taken place at FileMaker
previously after senior management left.

Among those laid-off were FileMaker's entire
Sustaining Engineering team, which tackled bug reports
and decided what reports were genuinely bugs that
needed to be passed on to the main engineering team for
correction. In its place, FileMaker's engineers who
develop the code base will deal directly with bug
reports.

Citing Apple policy, a FileMaker spokesperson had no
comment regarding the lay-offs.




Helpful Harry
Hopefully helping harassed humans happily handle handiwork hardships ;o)

As I commented in another post (a couple of weeks ago), I am glad that I
have not upgraded from 5.5 yet. This product (7) was NOT ready ... there
were too many bugs. The earlier departure of Le and now the dismissal of
approx. 13 developers tells me the complaints from people who bought 7 has
hit home. The good thing is ... the restructuring will hopefully bring a
quick resolution to bugs that plague FM 7.

Thanks for the post Harry!

--
Lawrance Database Designs
A J Lawrance
British Columbia, Canada
URL: http://www.members.shaw.ca/ajlawrance/


"Helpful Harry" <helpful_harry (AT) nom (DOT) de.plume.com> wrote

FMI has gone through similar series of employee turnover after prior
major releases. FM7 has been in development for years, the dev team was
burnt, and their longterm leader was let go. The product's release was
delayed long beyond when it was originally scheduled. Although Chung's
team ended up with a great product, there was probably a lot of internal
turmoil and strife over its delays. It is probably time for a new team
anyhow.

FileMaker 8 has also been in the works for at least a year, and the
product manager for that release is still with FMI and has been there
for years. Future development continues.

FileMaker has sold 10 million copies worldwide and has been around for
20 years. Not many software companies can make those claims. The
company is owned by Apple and has lots of money and technical resources
behind it. It's not going anywhere.


Nelson wrote:
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Howard Schlossberg (818) 883-2846
FM Pro Solutions Los Angeles, California

FileMaker 7 Certified Developer
Associate Member, FileMaker Solutions Alliance

In article <10lttbqhh0ou3d1 (AT) corp (DOT) supernews.com>,
Howard Schlossberg <howard (AT) antispahm (DOT) fmprosolutions.com> wrote:


-snipped-

Posts like these are why I love the Howard. The voice of sanity in a
gossipy thread.

Lou

In article <loulesko-119D80.01083803102004 (AT) news (DOT) giganews.com>, Lou
Lesko <loulesko (AT) yahoo (DOT) com> wrote:

It's not quite true though. FileMaker is a completely separate company
to Apple (and has been 'spun-off' for a long time now), although no
doubt if FileMaker got into real trouble Apple MIGHT well step up and
re-finance its little brother for a while ... depending on how bad the
trouble was of course.


As someone else said, there's often lots of staff changes after a big
release or moving offices ... although that's more usually people
quitting rather than being laid-off.



Helpful Harry
Hopefully helping harassed humans happily handle handiwork hardships ;o)

And apple sure seems solid these days.
I you look at their stock chart for the last 3-4 years (since they
introduced OSX), they have increased a staggering 160%. Microsoft
during the same period has lost nearly 20% of their value. Bigger is
not always better.

AL Lawrance wrote:

Not ready? I'll have to question that. While I haven't given as much
attention to FM as in 5.5, I haven't found it to be "not ready" - and
it's a fantastic improvement over 5.5 - which I did upgrade from.

Helpful Harry <helpful_harry (AT) nom (DOT) de.plume.com> wrote

Maybe they can find one or two developers who can make script steps be
copy-and-pastable, after only like 20 years.

Nelson <nelson (AT) nowhere (DOT) com> wrote:

Woah fella! Is this before, or after, the "Apple spin-off" software
company adds scroll-wheel support under Mac OS X?

I may not live another 40 years, so if we only get one stunningly
obvious feature every 20 years, I vote for scroll wheel support :-)



--
To send email, remove the invalid and nospams.

In article <1glm53a.106gw64dgplogN%md03NOSPAM (AT) xochiNOSPAM (DOT) com.invalid>,
md03NOSPAM (AT) xochiNOSPAM (DOT) com.invalid (Michael Diehr) wrote:
You'll have a long wait for scrollwheel support - it's an ex-Apple
company and Apple mice don't have scrollwheels. ;o)

Helpful Harry
Hopefully helping harassed humans happily handle handiwork hardships ;o)