The IntelligentPad object-oriented development environment is now out in a Windows 3.1 version

Fujitsu Ltd has come out with a Windows 3.1 version of IntelligentPad, a new development paradigm which came out of work at Hokkaido University, and is now available from the company for personal computers other than its own. Developed by Associate Professor Tanaka at Hokkaido University in conjunction with Fujitsu and Hitachi Ltd’s Hitachi Software Engineering, the hardware and operating system-independent middleware provides an object-oriented environment under which application development can be done by combining software components called pads. New pads can be created using C or C++ functions. Fujitsu positioned IntelligentPad as one of its main object-oriented applications in June last year and in July assisted in the formation of the IP Consortium, chartered to promote the standardisation of the application interfaces. The IntelligentPad/Works software priced at $915, requires Microsoft Corp’s C or C++ Development System, and runs on top of IntelligentPad, which costs $542. The Windows version is available for IBM Japan Ltd’s PS/55, NEC Corp’s PC-9800 and the Compaq Computer Corp DeskPro/i series.

Fujitsu rallies allies for third party maintenance

Fujitsu Ltd is getting into third party maintenance, offering a one-stop shop service from April 1 to customers with multi-vendor installations, although customers will initially be limited to those with personal computers from IBM Japan Ltd, NEC Corp, Apple Japan and Mitsubishi Electric Corp, and Oracle Corp and Informix Software Inc database management software. Its new CE partners include Mitsubishi Office Machines, Uchida Esco and Sanshin Electric, which together with Fujitsu will be able to mobilise 27,000 engineers from a total of 1,000 sites around Japan. Fujitsu says that it is hoping to build the initiative into a new business generating $37m a year within three years.

Habitat from FM Towns now available for Macintosh

Fujitsu has also launched a Macintosh version of Habitat, a communications software package originally developed for the FM Towns multimedia personal computer. Habitat was developed based on an idea of Lucas Arts of Los Angeles, localised for the Japanese market and provided over Fujitsu’s Nifty-Serve on-line personal computer network, on which it claims over 9,000 users. It was initially available only on the FM-Towns, but Fujitsu released versions of Habitat for its own FMR series, and Matsushita Electric Industrial Co’s PanaCom M series of personal computers as well as NEC Corp’s market-leading PC-9800 series. The new version of Habitat for the Mac is available at a low price of $62; Fujitsu hopes to sell 1,500 copies in the next year.

New family of gate arrays aimed at workstation, multimedia markets

Fujitsu Ltd has a new series of 0.5 micron process CMOS ASICs for use in engineering workstations and multimedia devices. The new series includes nine types of the CG51 series CMOS gate array, and nine types of a CE51 series micro-embedded cell array. The new products have four times the integration of the current 0.8 micron CMOS CG31-CE31 series, incorporating a maximum of 750,000 basic cells. The gate delay is 1.4 times faster at 210pS. Sample shipments and mass production begin from this month, and Fujitsu is aiming at production of 30,000 units per month, building to 50,000 units per month in the second half of the year.

Fujitsu brings AT compatibility to its Oasys office line

A new model in Fujitsu’s Oasys line of office automation systems offers IBM Corp AT compatibility for the first time. The Oasys machines were previously totally proprietary, but Fujitsu finally succumbed to the AT-compatible trend and released a series of personal computers based on the AT standard last November, now known as the Oasys 48V series. In addition to an Intel Corp 25MHz 80486SX and 4Mb of main memory, the new model incorporates a 400dpi high-speed multi-line printer as well as the basic Oasys word processor machine which made the Oasys name so well

-loved among 3.5m Japan word processor users. Both MS-DOS and the Oasys operating system are pre-installed on the 170Mb hard disk. The new machine is priced at $3,860 and Fujitsu expects to sell 5,000 of the things.

Compact 3.5 magneto-optical for the OEM market aimed at notebooks

A new 230Mb rewritable magneto-optical 3.5 disk drive, the M2512A has been launched onto the OEM market. The new drive is 1 high and has a very small footprint designed to fit into all personal computers and workstations; it also has a low-power, 5V, 7W power requirement, making it suitable for use in notebooks. The drive complies with the ECMA-201 standard and can handle either 128Mb or 230Mb 3.5 magneto-optical disks. Volume production will begin this month with 200,000 units planned for sale in fiscal 1995 at $950 a time.

Exekit business software to be offered on HP 9000s

Fujitsu Ltd and Hewlett-Packard Co announced in Tokyo that they plan to co-operate in the marketing of Fujitsu’s Exekit business software, known as Manasus 2 in the Japanese market, on Hewlett-Packard’s HP 9000 family of Unix systems, looking for sales of 500 copies over the next three years at $22,500 a time. Fujitsu has sold 350 copies of Exekit since it introduced the business software last May, almost all in Japan, although a few copies have been sold in Australia, South Korea and other countries in southeast Asia. The new agreement with Hewlett-Packard will not be limited to Japan, the companies said. Fujitsu says that software and related services now account for 13% to 14% of parent company sales, and could reach 20% within five years.

Wellfleet alliance is aimed at network carriers

In the US, Fujitsu Network Transmission Systems Inc has joined forces with Billerica, Massachusetts-based Wellfleet Communications Inc to develop and market a high-speed internetworking system integrating Wellfleet’s routing and switching and Fujitsu’s Sonet Synchronous Optical Network technologies. Fujitsu will resell Wellfleet’s multiprotocol Backbone Node Switch family, providing Frame Relay, Switched Multi-Megabit Data Services, Internet Protocol and native mode local network switching services to major network carriers, and its field personnel will also receive Wellfleet product training. The combination is intended to enable network carriers to integrate disparate networks via a single physical network infrastructure. The two also plan joint development of router technology that will be integrated into Fujitsu’s FLM Sonet-based multiplexer family.