The dwindling band of surviving members of the Advanced Computing Environment are mournfully wailing the old song Wedding bells are breaking up that old gang of mine these days, and the skids have been under the initiative ever since Compaq Computer Corp said ciao. Now it looks as if that $50,000-a-place ACE Executive Advisory Board organised back in January is on its way to the dumpster as well. MIPS Computer Systems Inc’s ACE liaison officer and vice-president of software technology, Larry Weber, said that the 16 companies on the board won’t be sent their third-quarter bills until after all the MIPS-Silicon Graphics merger details are cleaned up – that’s moving fast – and the need for these funds is reassessed. He suspects the bills may never get sent and that the board will simply become inactive, with the members content to let the newly constituted MIPS Technologies plot strategy and direction. Weber, by the way, isn’t making the jump to the newly merged company.
