Fujitsu as a stand-alone brand

If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. Executives in Germany and Japan obviously concluded around the same time towards the end of 1990s that what sleepy Siemens needed most was a shot in the arm of Japanese inventiveness, and the thing Fujitsu needed most was a hefty slug of German reliability.

Nixdorf, now nichts mehr

Strangely this was Siemens’ second stab at silicon synergy building. In the early 1990s it had already embarked on a joint venture with Nixdorf. As Europe’s 4th biggest computer giant, and a specialist in banking and point-of-sales systems, Nixdorf was the ideal stepping stone for Siemens into the difficult area of computing. Basically, Siemens was too sluggish to get anywhere by itself – a common disease with bludgeoning businesses.

So Siemens Nixdorf became Fujitsu Siemens. I think it’s a nice alliance. We could do without the waffly Solution Alliance Partner (what do I care?), but in terms of BtB co-branding, it makes a symbiotic mix out of sushi and bratwurst that whets the appetite of any IT executive looking for the best of both worlds.