Newsday (Nassau Edition) from Hempstead, New York • 103

On East Side West Side ourists Flocking to Town By Barbara Selvin people is the tree at Rockefeller Center "You even walk through the crowds" said Bonnie COMPUTERS Yes the Japanese Are Thinking PC By Martin Levine FOR SEVERAL YEARS NOW one of the burning questions that has dominated discussions within the personal -computer business has been when and how not if the giants of the Japanese consumer-electronics industry will add personal computers to the list of products virtually synonymous with the "made in tag That it happened so far says more about the nature of the personal -computer business and its foundation in software applications than it does about the Japanese Despite more than a few false steps in the past two years a number of Japanese firms are making inroads in several areas Such well-known consumer-electronics suppliers as Hitachi and JVC are agg? essively going after Original Equipment Man lfacturers accounts where they can sell hard-cisk drives monitors and other components to US brand-name marketers And by now tne rapid takeover of the 256K RAM chip industry by the Japanese has been well-documented However the chief prize for the Japanese remains the CPU (Central Processing Unit) itself and Epson Sharp Sanyo and Panasonic among others are doggedly going after sales in this area All have accepted IBM PC compati bility as a fact of life Epson is slugging it out in the low end of that ms aet with a line of three models offering IBM XTNAT compatibility while Sanyo has go it after a more mid-line approach with a bund It software package Perhaps most interesting though is the strategy that has been developed by Panasonic the US arm of the mammoth Matsushita Electric Corp in Japan Panasonic is a market force in everything from color televisions to bicycles and now a strict focus on portable computing is expected to have the same effect here first PC entry the Senior Partner transportable was introduced two years ago as an all-in-one package combining the CPU built-in monitor and two disk drives and a built-in thermoprinter And while Panasonic executives have acknowledged that the printer was less than enthusiastically received in some quarters it apparently also served a purpose "When we first introduced the Senior Partner we needed something different so we have a said computer products division group marketing manager Ed Gelb "and the printer adds only two pounds and about $100 to the Panasonic also plans a role in the development of software long the critical weak link in the Japanese drive for the US computer market Panasonic would not develop software on its own but would likely work with developers in the business-applications area The hottest segment of the portable market now belongs to the so-called Lap Top lightweight computers that can be carried in a briefcase and literally plopped on the lap Though Panasonic has yet to unveil an entry here its Executive Partner EP is thought to be the forerunner of a full line of lap tops that will compete with models from Data General Tandy NEC and strongly rumored) IBM Lap tops represent a crucial opportunity for Panasonic and other Japanese suppliers who can apply miniaturization techniques and display technology that could provide a clear advantage over some of their US competitors The Executive Partner for example applies a gas-plasma flat display screen with brightness contrast and resolution much better than LCD screens found in most other lap tops on the market and about equal to that of the electro-luminescence display pioneered by Sharp Electronics When asked when the company might introduce a lap top with a gas-plasma display and a built-in disk drive Gelb smiled and said like to have And other Panasonic executives hint that just such a product could be introduced later this year An Martin Levine edits Consumer Electronics Monthly amt Arnold the public-relations manager Up to 3 million people view the tree each year Across the street at Radio City Music Hall more than 600000 people are expected to see the nnnl 90-minute Christmas spectacular raising more than $10 million from the 119 shows But at the Rockefeller Center skating rink general manager Michael Traver said the rink does about half its business during the holiday period "Our regular customers tend to stay away because too Traver said "Ninety percent of our customers this time of year are Museums too do well at holiday time During Christmas week attendance at the Metropolitan Museum of Art swell as much as fourfold depending on what exhibitions are in town But Broadway hardly benefits from Hie pre-Christmas bustle "Just before Christmas business is said George Wachtel research director at the League of American Theaters and Producers Tourism in New York City has been stable over the past 15 years relatively unaffected if bureau figures are a guide recessions strikes or brush with bankruptcy in 1974 The tourism business hit its nadir in 1971 when as Gillett put it "everyone was using us as a for the growing urban ills New York was seen as Sin City crime-ridden and unhealthy But two things changed that image according to Gillett: People began to realize that urban problems were not limited to New York And the bureau launched its Big Apple campaign What has affected the level of tourist traffic most in recent years is the strength of the dollar The number of foreign visitors to New York rose slightly in 1985 to 242 million resuming a 25-year pattern of increases that was interrupted by three years of decline Foreign travel peaked at 27 million visitors in 1981 by comparison 960000 foreigners came in 1964 Those figures however cover only those who get their passports stamped here viators entering the United States elsewhere included People in the tourist industry tend to be boosters anyway but predicting a glorious 1986 in part because of the unveiling of the refurbished Statue of Liberty and the April opening of the Jacob Javits Convention Center Already 128 shows have been booked for the first year of operation said Thomas Galvin president and chief executive officer of the center bringing an estimated 2 million visitors and $77 million in tax revenues Leslie Bega of Los Angeles had just arrived at Rockefeller Center with Stacie Lambert of Brook-ville her freshman roommate at the University of Southern California It was the first hour of her first visit to New York and she was falling in love with the city "This is the epitome of she said posing for a snapshot with the giant tree in the background A few minutes later she was consuming her first New York City purchase: a $1 hot pretzel slathered with mustard This is she said grinning au child two of 242 Manhattan NEW YORK IS a mecca for tourists at Christmas Witness: Seven young Thai students traveled from the college they attend in Atlanta to see the city embellished for the holidays "We came because of the tree over there" said Vir-oon Powlinjong nodding toward Rockefeller Center as he stood on the steps of St Cathedral Tourism officials in New York City say the Big Apple is "the number one tourist destination" Each year about 17 million stay in the 100000 hotel rooms This year hotel guests alone spent an estimated $24 billion The president of the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau Charles Gillett guessed that perhaps another 10 million people visit the city each year and all spend something So tourism which includes people who come to New York for conventions and trade shows as well as sightseers adds up to a hefty bite of the Big $168 6-billion annual output of goods and services The number of New York City hotel guests fell by about 135000 from last year although spending rose by an estimated $47 million the bureau said For the United States as a whole 1985 was the best year for tourism since 1981 the year before the nation went into an economic recession Americans spent 579 billion nights away from home in 1985 up 10 percent over last figure of 526 billion said Douglas Frechtling director of the US Travel Data Center in Washington DC "Generally speaking New York is really a 12-month-a-year town" Gillett said not like a seaside or ski resort" Sightseeing predominates in the summer a trend that continued this year de- spite a 27-day hotel strike Conventions are most frequent in October When the hotels are filled with sightseers rather than convention delegates it means less money for the city The 44 million delegates to the 953 conventions spent $964 million this year on average they stayed 42 nights and spent $600 Other tourists stayed an average of three nights and spent $450 according to the visitors bureau The hotel business is traditionally slower at this time of year but people who work at the big- gest attractions are busiest between Thanksgiving and Christmas At the Empire State Building on the day after i Christmas 7000 people forked over $3 ($175 for kids and the elderly) to gawk at the views from the I observation decks according to Richard Lally assis-I tant director of the observatories That compares with 3000 or 4000 on an average winter day At the New York Stock Exchange where the visitors center offers free tours of the frenetic activity on the trading floor the day after Thanksgiving pulls in about 10000 people up to twice as many visitors as most other days says Richard renzano the chief spokesman Perhaps the biggest Christmas attraction the one that says December in New York to the most A Swiss mother and million foreign visitors to NEWSDAY MONDAY DECEMBER 30 1985 3 Part III.