Well how about that! Microsoft Corp has been quietly hinting to big users that they might be better off waiting for the Windows95 interface on NT than migrating to Windows95 itself, and saying that the beta release should be ready by the end of the year, with the thing out sometime in the first half of next year – but we know of at least one user that already has the beta release, and he says it works as if it were a finished product – sounds as if Microsoft is holding it back so as not to spoil the Windows95 launch – and if Microsoft wants to find it who is talking out of turn, it will have its work cut out – we also hear that it has sent out 70,000 copies of the beta release!
Bolt Beranek & Newman Inc, now being run by IBM Corp alumnus George Conrades, has won a powerful ally in its plunge into Internet service provision (well the Cambridge company did build Arpanet, which evolved into the Internet) in the shape of AT&T Corp: the two are joining forces to provide businesses with a broad range of services for access to the Internet, covering means to access, plan, set up, operate and maintain dedicated leased-line connections; the agreement is expected to generate more than $120m over a three-year period for BBN Planet Corp , Bolt Beranek’s Internet services subsidiary, the partners say.
Germany is so proud of the Bundesbank and the system under which it operates that it wants to replicate it wherever possible: Postal Minister Wolfgang Btsch is considering giving the German telecommunications regulator the status of an Oberste Bundesbehrde or highest federal authority; in the UK, the government rather than the regulator grants operating licences, while in the United States, Congress had an important influence, he said; Vebacom AG, the telecommunications subsidiary of Veba AG, criticised the government’s handling of deregulation, saying the process was taking too long and key issues such as access to networks and fee structures were still not decided.
Deutsche Telekom AG told Reuters’ Bonn office that it has already agreed with a group of partners a common standard for a television set-top decoders for digital broadcasting, but would not provide details or say who the other companies were, refusing to confirm the names given in Der Spiegel (CI No 2,688), saying the companies only wanted to go public with a final, complete agreement on the system.
Are we talking digital here? Rochester, New York-based Eastman Kodak Co announced yesterday that it plans to invest $300m at its Kodak Park plant in Rochester to support manufacture of a new advanced photographic system for 1996 launch.
IBM Corp’s Mr OS/2, Lee Reiswig, has repeated to the Wall Street Journal what has been the official line for two or three years now, that OS/2 won’t include a Windows95 compatibility mode, and therefore won’t run 32-bit applications written for Microsoft Corp’s next-generation operating system, adding the usual rider that it may change its mind if there’s enough demand.
The old IBM Corp drove everybody mad because it would never say anything, the new IBM drives everybody mad because it says everything – and all the answers conflict: in what appears to be a brave new world of federal management, if you ask somebody intimately involved with the technology of say the AS/400, you get a clear answer, but if you put what you’ve just been told to his boss, he completely contradicts it, and when you try to clear it up with the software guy who is writing to the new hardware, he tells you something that conflicts with both the other answers – so it is that while Anthony Santelli, general manager of the Power Personal Systems Division was telling Reuters what our story on today’s front page says, that IBM was negotiating to license Mac OS for the PC Power Series, his boss, Richard Thoman, executive in charge of IBM’s personal computer business, was telling the New York Times that the company would license Mac OS only if customers demanded it and the terms of a future licensing agreement were reaso
nable – as an outsider, he just loves wielding the jargon, so he added we will put the technology on the platform where customers demand it.
Like the small fish that follow sharks around or the tick birds that find their sustenance in the insects that infest the hide of a rhinoceros, sycophantic little companies flock around the announcement of any new computer line from one of the majors, piping up that they welcome the launch and plan to support the machine in the hopes of picking up some reflected glory: in the case of IBM Corp’s new PC Power Series, such companies all seem to be treating the machines simply as rather odd RS/6000s.
We’re going to have to find out about this, but it sounds completely off the wall, and comes from a company that appears to be painfully illiterate, with statements such as International Automated Systems Inc is patent pending on a new communication system, it will affect approximately every type of communication around the world, and DWM can operate completely wireless: the system is called Digital Wave Modulation – what is it? What indeed – and is claimed to transmit over 1.8G-bytes per second and rather than requiring a vast telephone exchange, 150,000 concurrent calls can be switched on a Pentium computer; and it can also cram 900 television channels into the capacity presently required by just one, according to the company, which is in American Fork, Utah.
Macromedia Inc, San Francisco has launched FreeHand 5 for Windows and claims it is the first Windows drawing software to be native 32-bit: it’s out this month at $600.
Merix Corp, the company buying Hewlett-Packard Co’s Loveland, Colorado printed circuit board plant and operations (CI No 2,688) – which gets a supply agreement for boards from Hewlett under the deal and expects the company to continue to be a major customer for the plant, is based in Forest Grove, Oregon, and started life as the Circuit Board Division of Tektronix Inc in 1959, and was spun off in an initial public offering last year.
3Com Corp has completed its acquisitions of Primary Access Corp for about 2.8m shares and Sonix Communications Ltd for about 1.2m shares: the two have changed their names to 3Com Primary Access and 3Com Sonix.
Wang Laboratories Inc and now Microsoft Corp rival FileNet Corp has put its WorkFlo imaging software up on Sun Microsystems Inc machines.
Newport Beach, California-based Virtual Realty Network Inc has joined forces with Intel Corp on an on-line home mortgage processing service in which home buyers can negotiate with mortgage lenders by videoconferencing: called Loanmaker, the service is an electronic network using Intel’s ProShare kit to connect home buyers and mortgage lenders face-to face if both sides are sitting at personal computers.
Motorola Inc added a new voice pager, the Tenor, that uses its InFlexion high-speed speech and data protocol, claiming that it makes the most efficient use of spectrum and offers the highest channel capacity possible – over 50 times greater than previous protocols ena bling speech technology.
Noel Forgeard, chairman of the Matra Defence Espace SA unit of the Lagardere Groupe SA has asked the French government for a place in the satellite merger being discussed between Aerospatiale SA and Daimler-Benz Aerospace GmbH: the move would also bring the UK in via the Matra Marconi Space venture.
Daimler-Benz AG denied a press report that it did not intend to exercise its option to increase its stake in Sogeti AG, majority shareholder in Cap Gemini Sogeti SA: a decision about renouncing our option is not an issue at the moment, a Daimler spokeswoman told Reuters; Daimler’s Debis holds 34% of Sogeti and an option to take it up to 51%.
Illinois Superconductor Corp says its first major product line of radio frequency filters for the cellular telephone industry exceeded expectations in recent tests: president Ora Smith told shareholders at the annual meeting that the SpectrumMaster filters have
demonstrated interference rejection levels up to 50dB, or 100,000 times, greater than conventional filters in use in the wireless industry; it is currently assembling and testing its first SpectrumMaster units and plans to ship them to customers for qualification testing this year.
Unisys Corp has a contract valued at nearly $188m over five years from the Federal Computer Acquisition Center under the US Coast Guard’s Standard Workstation III Acquisition programme: Unisys says that under the contract it will deliver an integrated system that includes open systems-based commercial-off-the-shelf microcomputer hardware, software, communications products, and related services; the new standard workstations will be used both ashore and afloat for office automation and command and control applications, and Unisys will supply hardware, software, installation, maintenance, training, documentation and support services to 40,000-plus Coast Guard active military and civilian users.
