By Rachel Chalmers After a ham-fisted attempt to pass unexpectedly high microprocessor prices along to its business customers, Apple Computer Inc has promised that it will honor all orders for its Power Macintosh G4 computers placed before Wednesday October 13, 1999 at the originally quoted prices. We aim to delight our customers, and we clearly […]
By Rachel Chalmers
After a ham-fisted attempt to pass unexpectedly high microprocessor prices along to its business customers, Apple Computer Inc has promised that it will honor all orders for its Power Macintosh G4 computers placed before Wednesday October 13, 1999 at the originally quoted prices. We aim to delight our customers, and we clearly dropped the ball in this instance, admitted perpetual interim CEO Steve Jobs. We apologize to our customers for upsetting and disappointing them during this past week. Our actions today will hopefully set things right.
Apple cited supply constraints on the part of its microprocessor supplier, Motorola Inc, when it retroactively hiked prices and reconfigured it G4 business desktop product line. Instead of a 400, a 450 and a 500MHz model, Apple said it would offer a 350, a 400 and 450MHz configurations. Customers who had pre-ordered G4s were told that their orders had been cancelled and that higher prices would apply to re-orders. These customers were less than thrilled, and a storm of email complaints rained on the computer maker.
By Friday, the company had been forced to exempt certain customers from the price hikes. This latest announcement should see all pre-orders fulfilled except those for the 500MHz G4, which won’t be available until next year. Customers who pre- ordered 500MHz machines will be offered the 450MHz model at its originally quoted price. Apple still has some $750m worth of back orders – around 400,000 systems – it must fulfill. Some 300,000 of these orders are for iBook consumer portables, whose production was hit hard by the Taiwan earthquake. The errant G4s account for the remaining 100,000.
