Hoax or true? Petro could get a batch of 1500x A1200

[danwood]

I'm friends with Petro on Facebook, just looked at his wall now and cannot see any mention of anything like this.

Also the first link just takes me to a German log-in page.

I'd have to see some more proof before believing this to be true.  I find it unlikely they'd have been sitting around for almost 20 years?

That said I wouldn't mind getting hold of an A1500 if it does turn out to be true.  

Cut & paste the original post for us non-a1.org members anyone?

[danwood]

Hmmn just wondered if this could be related to the warehouse worth of A1200s that were rumoured to have gone missing during the Escom/Gateway handover?

http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbthread.pl/amiga/expand/76089

I remember Bill Mcewen trying to track them down for a few years back in the early 00s.

[danwood]

And no, Petro obviously didn't keep "a hidden stash of Amigas", he sold them to some Indian entity towards the end of "Amiga Technologies", and now it seems like a great deal of them never came to use and remain unsold by that Indian entity, and now Petro has contacted that old customer and put an offer on those machines that clearly *never* will be sold by that Indian company in 2012 (meaning: from that Indian entity's point of view, that worthless pile of junk occupying floor space in some warehouse suddenly got a small value).

Bill McEwen was certainly claiming that a warehouse worth of Amigas went missing when they took over Amiga Inc back in 2000ish.  I remember him saying at Amiwest 01 that inventory had been stolen, they knew who it was and "we're coming to get you".

Basically Bill went to Germany to inspect the inventory that they had bought. But when he got there the warehouses were empty. Apparently Amiga have a good idea where all the stuff went, but would appear powerless to get it back.

http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbthread.pl/amiga/expand/76092

http://www.ann.lu/comments2.cgi?view=1027828288&category=news#message21

Bill was also on the hunt for copies of invoices from Amiga dealers from the Amiga Technologies era:

http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=46958

On another note, we have had a very strange request about sales that
occurred from 1996 through 2000 regarding Amiga computers. Now I understand based on the documentation that we have here that the machines were purchased primarily from Petro at Amiga International.

http://www.ann.lu/comments2.cgi?view=1062268363&category=forum

There were also tales of former Commodore plants in the Philippines continuing to produce Amigas well after CBM went under, reports from witnesses say the lights were on and Amigas were still being produced in November 1994, authorised by the Philippines government to try and claw back money owed from CBM under supervision from soldiers!

From November 1994:

http://mobile.google.com/group/comp.sys.amiga.advocacy/browse_thread/thread/44ab8e845fc57b1c/7a662a118332f6a3?#7a662a118332f6a3

   Yes... a friend of mine has relatives that went to the plant
THIS WEEK and reported:

        "The lights are on; they are building computer."

He also stated that they are white colored. We suspected that they
were building A4000's, because people have A4000's with manufacture\
dates after the liquidation, but European suppliers who are receiving
these machines say they are all or mostly PAL A1200's.

 Those soldiers have been overseeing production of A1200's for
weeks now. The government is building the machines and keeping the money
for themselves.

        This was verified by someone who drove 1 hour to the plant
and saw it with his own eyes. This has been proven by people receiving
machines dated over the past few weeks. They are mostly PAL A1200's.
I thpought that some were A4000's or A4000T's, but later was told that
none of them are.

So there are definitely tales and folklore of missing and black market Amigas, and Bill McEwen certainly was on the hunt for some around a decade ago.

[danwood]

So, since they were owed money from Commodore, who was now out of business...
They decided to best way to get money was to build more machines that Commodore would never be able to buy?

I'm not a business savvy person, but I'm not sure that would be a good idea...  :laugh1:

desiv

Presumably from the left over inventory in the factory, I don't think they were selling them to Commodore, they were being sold on the black market to business/customers in Europe from reports.

Apparently there were A1200s/4000s with manufacture dates after April '94 when CBM went under, so this would verify that.

[danwood]

Which was exactly my point...

It does make me hope it is true though, the look on Bill and Fleecy's faces arriving in Germany to an empty warehouse and Petro laughing off into the sunset with a truck full of A1200s, fills me with joy

[danwood]

This is the kind of talk that makes me question why I associate with Amigans.  Why is it hate first and foremost every time?

Seriously, people believe that this was some grand get rich quick scheme all along?  Store a hoard of stolen Amigas (next to worthless in the market at the time) and expect there to be a market for them in 17 years?

The most obvious reason these became available:
A large sale was made to a new market.
The market flopped when Amiga went under and the computers became almost worthless.
Petro inquired as to what ever happened to them or it came up in conversation.
Owner wants to get some of his lost investment back instead of paying to store them.
End of story.

There's no hate from me at all, just does seem a coincidence that people were claiming a warehouse of Amigas went missing back then and now suddenly 1500 have turned up.

No skin off my nose if it's true or not, in fact it's quite pleasing if it is true, would mean at least McEwen got some comeuppance for years of conning everyone else.

It's more an interesting/historical discussion rather than finger pointing and accusation. The two stories are going to draw comparisons.