Aftermath

In 2002 a company called emanio acquired the Trading Partner and OnCall EDI lines from Mercator Software. Some of the remaining staff in Bannockburn were offered positions with emanio that allowed them to work remotely. emanio continues to support and update Trading Partner, no word on whether they removed the Easter Egg.

On August 4 2003 Ascential Software acquired Mercator Software for $106 million in cash, 3.16% of what it was worth on March 7 2000. On March 15 2005 IBM acquired Ascential Software for 1.1 billion.

Roy C. King would go on to hold CEO positions at Security Source and Gevity Hr before taking his current CEO position at Integrated Wealth Services, LLC. I suppose some would hold a grudge against a wealthy CEO who laid them off. Not me. Mercator, like hundreds of similar companies at the time, was spiraling out of control when he came in. He was in a position that required some unpopular actions if there was to be any chance of turning the company around. I'm sure he didn't want his first CEO gig to start with layoffs, or maybe he did, either way it's pointless to feel anything but ambivalence towards him.

The VP who I gave the disastrous demo to in 1998 now owns a Goddard School franchise.