NICHE MARKETING - ROUTE TO MILLIONS 

By now almost everyone has heard about niche marketing ..... where resources are devoted to being absolutely the best in a small, perhaps even infinitesimal segment of a larger market and scope extended maybe to the whole world. A perfect example lies in the activity of one small but growing company in the B .C. Lower Mainland -- Advanced Gravis Computer Technology Ltd., of Burnaby.

Gravis makes joysticks. Not the computer games are played on. Not the software that allows the computer to play such games. Just the joystick that controls moving things around on the screen. Look at Gravis as the manufacturer of hockey sticks. They don't have anything to do with the stadium, the game, the players or the puck. Just the hockey stick. Joysticks are the hockey sticks of tomorrow. Too small a financial game you say? Gravis is already turning over $5 million annually, have 70 employees and nowhere to go but up. Joysticks you see, are more than they appear. They are the wedge into tomorrow's new entertainment, education and informational field -- virtual or artificial reality. A field, where up to recently, no man or stick has gone before. This isn't getting in on the ground floor (an expression from the Industrial Age), it's getting in on the excavation!

Personally, I've attempted to fly an F-18 fighter near the Golden Gate Bridge. As a long time airplane/helicopter/balloon pilot, I can tell you that the Gravis joystick adds a lot more realism to the game (Yes, I crashed on my first flight. Don't laugh, you never tried to fly "under" that bridge!).

This joystick is different. It is a lot more than a stick. It can be adjusted for "feel", so it feels just like a real airplane. It has a firing gun or mike button on top. It has two programmable buttons on the platform top and three programmable controls on the side. All can be singly or jointly programmed so choices are multiplied. It's the poor man's airline flight simulator with a 99.9 percent discount. If you want to see "value-added" to what previously was a commodity, take a look at this.

Just another toy for kids, you say. It is kid's toy, an a good one. Soon you will be able to use such a device to control settings that will allow you to control your home like pilots control a plane. The Gravis stick controls the computer that controls such actions, as turning off lights, opening doors, adjusting the TV and programming the microwave. In due course the joystick could measure your heart beat, pulse rate, stress level and the perspiration on your palms.

Retailing in Canada for under $50 this joystick is a best buy. Run-of-the-mill joysticks cost $15 to $25. The higher price for this device is worth it. If it's good enough for LucasFilms, the Smithsonian Institute and the U.S. military it must have something. Fred Blechman of COMPUTER SHOPPER says it's "The World's Best Joystick". I would agree.

More information: Rod Haidenger, Advanced Gravis Computer Technology, #111 - 7400 MacPherson Avenue, Burnaby, B.C. V5J 5B6. Phone: 604/434-7274. Fax: 604/434-7809.

* * *

< previous | chapter index | next >
back to Main Chapter Listing
back to Home Page