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Pick Up A Piece of Enron
shintaro points out this massive collection of "gear from Enron on auction.
Amongst the more than 3,000 in this auction (1 of 10) are state and federal law books, and numerous notebooks sans hard drives. Might be a good opportunity to pick up a Sun Enterprise Server?
Office furniture is also on offer, Herman Miller and Knolls all over, not an IKEA item in sight. Interesting what Enron employees and shareholders must feel looking at this loot."
Some of that equipement is outdated and not worth the minimum bid... I'll go back to pricewatch and ebay...
I touch computers in naughty places
Why is this under YRO?
In Soviet russia, only old Koreans profit from pictures of Natalie Portman stored on Beowulf Clusters.
Enron made campaign contributions totaling more than $5.7 million between 1989 and 2001. Republicans received 73% of this money. Ken Lay was an ardent supporter of George W. Bush during Bush's time as Governor of Texas. During the 2000 campaign, Lay allowed Bush to use Enron corporate jets to fly from stump speech to stump speech. So close were these men that Bush granted Lay a nickname: 'Kenny-Boy.'
About this time my '.com' was watching venture capital dry up. We had a meeting with Arthur Andersen to discuss our accounting product and I distinctly remember the 23 or 24 year guy not having the slightest clue why he was even meeting with us. Uniterested and pathetic questions. No wonder every audit firm in the universe used to APPROACH US at tradeshows - they must've thought EVERYONE was on the take.
Well my life since then plays like a broken country album. And Larry Ellison still looks like the devil. I hate this mellenium so far.
Stuff that matters.
Community programs are a bottomless pit into which tons of cash is wasted, I mean spent.
At least some up and coming business can get some good deals on expensive equipment.
These company auctions rarely offer discount prices on anything... People get caught up in the moment and end up paying crazy prices for hardware. Often times you actually do better by buying newer hardware, then picking up things from these auction
No joke--another thing to consider is that any hardware you pick up is going to be at least three and a half years old (Enron died 12/2000.)
Something I noticed in the listings is that everything seems to have a minimum bid of $200, no matter what it is. Compaq server rack? $200. Compaq server rack with builtin 15" LCD, keyboard, trackball, and KVM? $200.
Like you noted, anyone who finds a good deal is someone willing to buy by the pallet at fifty to seventy cents on the dollar. If you're a surplus dealer who can move that kind of volume, more power to you. Else, best advice is stay away.
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
What they do is keep it around, and you can call in after the auction to buy bunches of unsold items at a price.
For best results, do the webcast or go in person. There are massive deals to be had. At one auction I attended, a loaded Sun E450 (quad proc, 1gb ram, lots o disk) went for $900 + buyers premium of around 16%.
The downside to having many lots is the auctioneer will sometimes collapse identical lots into one to save time. If you've got the cash, it's a great way to get great deals. You can also propose lots, like "I'll take the next 10 sun boxes for $8000 total."
Auctions are a real trip, but you have to know how much stuff is worth, definitely. I've seen things go for above-retail prices, so be warned.
Ah, but you forget that people like this live by knowing the limits of the law, and exploring their edges. You can't play the game without knowing the rules!
At least some of those law books are probably well worn. Companies like this spend lots of time exploring what has and hasn't been explicitely been ruled to be illegal, and trying variations on what has been to get around whatever was perceived to be the downfall of the now-illegal ploy.