Texas Instruments Inc reckons its Extensa range of notebook computers (CI No 2,748) will propel it into the top five notebook vendors over the next two years and into the top three within four. From having only sold expensive, high-powered notebooks into the high-flying executive market – just 30% of the total notebook market, the company reckons – Texas has seen how other vendors have made money with lower-range goods and it’s going all-out to capture what it believes is its fair share of the other 70% of the notebook market. It’s expanded its distribution channels and the Extensas will be sold in retail stores both here and in the US. The company said it will be spending millions of dollars to market the family of lower-end notebooks and expects to double its notebook business worldwide. Although as a company it does not give figures on volume shipped, it admitted that it is looking to shift hundreds of thousands of the things. There are three members of the family: an entry-level model, 450/450T based on an 80486DX4/75 chip costing ú1,300; the 550 with a 75MHz Pentium, infra-red serial port, interchangeable floppy disk/CD-ROM and removable hard disk; and a 550CD/550CDT based on a 75MHz Pentium with the same features as the 550 but additonal sound board and the option of an active matrix screen, but it wasn’t giving prices.
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