http://www.oregonlive.com/news/99/12/st120304.html

Gremlins start New Year's partying early

The millennium bug isn't waiting until Jan. 1. It's striking in unexpected ways already, and it will continue to do so long after midnight on New Year's Eve.

Royal Doulton china may be one of the Year 2000 computer problem's earliest casualties.

The company that makes the famed china, Royal Doulton PLC of Staffordshire, England, has put itself up for sale, the British press reported this week.

And all because of a Y2K fix that failed.

Royal Doulton installed new Y2K-compliant warehouse management software this year. But software bugs gnawed at the delivery system for 10 weeks, costing the already-ailing company $19 million in sales. On Nov. 10, the company revealed its Y2K problems to shareholders, who sent the stock price into a 23 percent nose-dive.

After the stock fell, a bargain-hunting competitor, Waterford Wedgwood PLC of Ireland, snatched up 15 percent of the low-priced shares and hinted at buying more. This week, reports in The Independent of London say Royal Doulton may be shopping for a friendly buyer to save it from a hostile Waterford takeover.

The Royal Doulton fiasco alerts us to a crucial Y2K fact: Not all computer glitches will occur at 12:01 a.m. Jan. 1...

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-- Steve (hartsman@ticon.net), December 04, 1999

Answers

Humm.

That's sad news.

Could my grandmother's teacups be a collectors item?

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), December 04, 1999.

Someone posted this news LAST night, and one of the responders made the point that GUESS WHO makes the Berkefeld ceramic water purification/filter cartridges? Royal Doulton.

-- profit of doom (doom@helltopay.ca), December 04, 1999.