Forty Five

Kim and Brad were utterly stunned. They were speechless. Kim’s eyes widened, while all Brad could do was to slowly shake his head. “I just don’t understand, George,” he was finally able to say. “Kimberly has been killing herself the last two weeks for AT, and you’re saying we hate you? What’s going on?”

“Let’s take it from the top,” Bill Miller said. “First of all, of course, there’s Kim’s court case against us.” He smiled weakly and continued, “Just a few weeks ago, if she won, George and I would have just signed over the company to her. It really wasn’t worth much. But then what happened? Kimberly happened,” answering his own question. “She presents us with the best-designed machine tools the world has ever seen! But there’s more: You two may not even realize it, but because of the integrated computer controls, a product changeover can be managed in a matter of minutes rather than the hours it used to take.

“So what? you’re thinking. So it opens enormous new markets to us: companies