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Looking ahead at the future of flightsimming, what do you find? Lago. At least, the company claims to be looking ahead all the time. It's in their logo: Lago, looking ahead. Are they, really? Or is it just a sales-pitch, aimed at branding their products, and becoming the McDonald's or Coca-Cola of the flight-simulation world? It's not always easy to tell.
At any rate, what we do know for sure: there's no company quite as prolific as the people over at Lago are. At an astonishing rate, they put out one product after another. And judged by the comments in the forums, their clients are nothing if not enthusiastic fans of titles as FSAssist, Scenery Enhancer, and FSTraffic.
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Especially the new product FS Maintenance has caused a lot of excitement. One beta-tester wrote to Lago asking whether the product's price included any laundry service. He had lost his engine number 1, heading indicator and experienced a flap failure as well. He told Lago he got some soiled underwear to clean. The reality-check this implies seems to be indicative of the general quality of the products Lago is putting out. Sure, there are some bugs in earlier versions; but generally, Lago and its people are praised by its customers for the speediness of responses and their helpfulness toward their clients.
It's with these products that Lago made its fame. AVSIM Online thinks it's time that we get to know the people behind Lago a little bit better. What makes them tick? How do they work? And what are their plans? Andrea de Luca – Andy for internet-friends – is the brand-new product manager, who also has his hands on on-line sales. He could not miss this opportunity to tell the Avsim readers what Lago is all about.
Andy doesn't tell us, but it's not hard to find out where the name comes from. Lago was founded, he says, in the early '80s as a mail-order company. After teaming up with some flight-sim enthusiasts, Laura Maestri and Ugo Grandolini, the founders, decided to immerse themselves in that market. Take respectively the first part of Laura's name and the last part of Ugo, and there you go.
But there's more: the company is headquartered in Varese, on the foot of the Alps, in Northern-Italian Lombardy. It's an area known for its beautiful lakes (lago, in Italian): the Lago Maggiore, the Lago di Como and the Lago di Lugano are all nearby. Lastly, the first two letters conveniently remind us of the company's motto: looking ahead.
Nowadays, Lago is a part of Leader, a major Italian company that distributes entertainment software. Since the company is not quoted, understandably, Andy does not want to go into financial detail: so there's no information about profitability or turnover. "I don't believe we would like our competitors to know how stunningly successful we are at this moment:-)", is what he says. He does share some information, however, about the set-up of the office: "The Concepts & Developments department (ConDev) works from home offices in Amsterdam, Genova and many other cities around the world. In ConDev we work with three people full-time and always several others on a contract base. In the HQ we have a manager, two sales people (offline and online sales) and a few freelance support agents".
 Part of the Lago-crew. On the bottom row are Andy De Luca (Product Manager and on-line sales manager, sits with the silver tie), in the middle Matthijs Kok (in charge of Condev, the brains of Lago). Right Virgilio Bixio (owner of Leader, one of the major distributors of Entertainment software in Italy, and also owner of the majority of Lago Stocks). Top row: starting right Alberto Bartoli, Managing Director for Lago; far left is Anna Petruzzellis. She's responsible for boxed sales and contacts with international distributors. The guys and girls in the middle have administrative and sales jobs for both Leader and Lago. Andy didn't provide their names. |
Lago's main characteristic as a company is probably its international nature. People do business with each other through the internet; they have to, given that they work from Amsterdam, Genova and other places. "Email, phone and Messenger are our main business tools :-). Communications is the main issue that we need to keep in the back of our mind. But as we are all rather close and on friendly terms that is not a main problem at this moment", says Andy.
He recognizes that especially the cultural differences between so many different nationalities can lead to problems. However, he is reluctant to share any details with the Avsim readership: "These anecdotes are too embarrassing to tell", he maintains.
It's the products that count for Lago. Strange then that the producers themselves seem to have lost some interest in flight-simming: "It sounds corny and 'PR tinted' but without a doubt it is the customers that drive and motivate us. A good review is nice but a email from a customer that has an idea on how to make our products better is more valuable and motivating. Some of us do fly FS, many others have lost it as hobby. Sad fact. But there are enough games to keep us happy."
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Many Avsim readers would want to be a beta-tester for such exciting products as FS Maintenance. Beware: it's not easy at all to get on the team. "We have a Beta-Lead (Jaaky Krant) who handles the beta tests. Often they are complex and hurried and we are ever working on making that better. Our programs are often very complex as you know. We do have an internal beta team of good friends but for example for FSMaintenance we used the services of TecPilot. We can always use new testers but you better be darned good to make it. I suggest writing a message on our forums to get in touch with Jaaky", says Andy.
Lago sees JustFlight and Aerosoft as its main competitors. "We like their products a lot", according to Andy. About the future of flightsimming? "We have no idea where it will end. It's a fact that we can't go all the way, pilots are trained pros, and they often work with two persons on the same task." That's the single most important limitation on the further development of Flightsimming as a hobby. "If we push realism too far, we lose a lot of customers. There is a market for hyper-realism products but that market is small and expensive to work for. LAGO will try to find a middle ground."
And there's some exciting news – a tidbit, only, unfortunately – for those among us who like to use other simulators than Microsoft: Lago has got some things in the pipeline for other platforms, such as Fly and X-plane, as well. "I can't go into details", says Andy.
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However, we can be sure of one thing: Lago is going to surprise us some more. Looking ahead – is it just a sales pitch? Of course it is. Always. But it happens to contain more than a grain of truth. And that's good news for all of us.