The Panda Project Inc, the Boca Raton, Florida-based computer hardware innovator which never managed to sell its esoteric inventions in any great numbers, is to offload its systems business to UK company Round Stone Holdings Ltd for $5m in licensing fees over the next five years. Round Stone gets exclusive manufacturing, marketing and sales rights to the Rock City and Archistrat lines of computers, and inherits all of the division’s inventory. A maximum of $2m royalties per year in 2004 and 2005 is dependent on system sales. Panda is best known for developing its unusual Archistrat processor independent hardware servers using an arty, curved design, They included a backplane to enable CPU models to be interchanged -Intel and Alpha were the most commonly used. Panda also developed Compass interconnect technology and VSPA semiconductor packaging which can reduce board area size by three times and volume by six times. VSPA will now be the company’s main focus. Stanford Crane, Panda’s president and chairman, said that Panda’s limited capital resources and working capital needs during the development of VSPA made the spinning off of the systems business the best option. Crane is a shareholder in Round Stone Holdings.
