Evans & Sutherland Inc has formed a new division to concentrate on high-volume 3D visualization graphics systems for Windows NT. Few details have emerged of just what the new start-up division, Pixel Products, will be doing. But Salt Lake City-based E&S said desktop visual simulation was an increasingly important, high volume and high margin market for it. It will be headed by Robert H Ard, previously at Pinnacle Systems Inc. E&S began seriously talking about Windows NT back in 1996, and says that 80% of its business is now NT-based, resulting in a 30% market share of the high-end NT graphics market. Its OEMs include Hewlett-Packard Co, Compaq Computer Corp, Micron Electronics Inc and Siemens-Nixdorf Informationssysteme AG. Its Realimage 2000 chipset – previously known as 3DPR, and manufactured for E&S by Mitsubishi Electric Co – is now in its third product cycle, with shipments beginning last month. High-end Harmony graphics systems also run on NT, though E&S still has Unix-based hardware for its very high-end ESIG commercial simulation systems. The company also recently returned to the volume graphics board market, through its acquisition earlier this year of AccelGraphics Inc (CI No 3,395), which is expected to be completed by July 1. AccelGraphics brings with it a third party distribution channel that could prove useful to Pixel Products, which is working on the packaging and distribution strategy it needs for high volume business. The business plan should be finalized over the next month or two, E&S said.
