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***Intergraph Signs on to MUSE Technologies VAR Program (December 22)
MUSE Technologies announced that it has entered into a Value Added Reseller (VAR) agreement with Intergraph Corporation for the sale of MUSE Technologies' data visualization software through Intergraph's distribution network. Intergraph will also develop solutions and applications for its international clientele using MUSE Technologies software.
The three-year VAR agreement anticipates $4 million in sales of MUSE Technologies products and provides Intergraph with non-exclusive worldwide rights to distribute MuSE (pronounced "muse," short for Multidimensional user-oriented Synthetic Environment) and Continuum, a collaboration product that permits multiple MuSE users to connect over global and local networks.
MuSE, which was originally developed at Sandia National Laboratories for the UNIX operating environment, was ported to WindowsNT earlier this year as part of a multi-phase contract with the US Navy. NASA, Chevron, Goodyear Tire & Rubber, Schlumberger, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Department of Transportation, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and the US Air Force are some of the organizations that have used the MuSE system for visualization.
The MuSE system has capabilities that permit users to incorporate features into their applications. Among these are voice synthesis and speech recognition; active or passive stereo vision; auditory cues; auditory data mapping; head tracking; 2-, 3- and 6-degree of freedom joysticks/pointing devices; desktop controls (e.g. pedals, dials, sliders, buttons); and mechanical and magnetic tracking. With these features, users in an office environment can create highly customized multisensory environments to integrate and understand complex data, develop solutions, or extend the capabilities of, for example, existing CAD, PDM, FEA or database systems.
Continuum, developed by MUSE Technologies as a companion product to MuSE, extends MuSE's capabilities into a shared multi-user environment that operates over local, enterprise and global networks. Multiple users in different geographic areas can enter the same multisensory environment and freely interact with the information and each other.
MUSE Technologies, Inc. (Albuquerque, NM) develops and markets software products that supports ones ability to visualize, analyze and understand large and diverse forms of data using UNIX and Windows NT. The Company's products support complex data integration and data management problems encountered by scientists, engineers, developers and other computing professionals. The Company also develops advanced collaborative software that enables groups of users to work together over local and global networks.
***Taiwan Forms Digital TV Committee and Begins Work With ATSC (December 16)
Newsbytes reports that a memorandum of understanding (MoU) agreement has been signed between Sarnoff Corp. and the Taiwan Digital Television Committee. With this a cooperative relationship with the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) has been established. The objective is to set up a Chinese standard for digital television broadcasting. Taiwan is expected to be the first Chinese-speaking country to broadcast digital TV.
***WinStar Commercially Deploys Point-To-Multipoint Technology (December 17)
WinStar Communications announced commercial deployment of its point-to-multipoint network technology in Washington, D.C. on schedule and said it is on track to deploy high-speed technology nationally during the next 12 months. The broadband wireless telecommunications, information and Internet services provider announced the connection of its point-to-multipoint service to its first paying customer and demonstrated its effectiveness.
WinStar said that its point-to-multipoint technology would enable the company to serve many more buildings from each local hub site. The point-to-multipoint technology will also lower its network deployment costs and quickly increase the number of prospective buildings and customers the fixed wireless carrier can bring onto its own broadband network.
The point-to-multipoint equipment, which integrates with WinStar's existing point-to-point network architecture, will deliver voice, data and video services to business customers in major markets throughout the U.S. WinStar customers use Wireless Fiber services for high-speed Internet access, full-motion video conferencing and native LAN-LAN interconnections, delivered at speeds up to 155 mbps per channel. WinStar provides these services over its own end-to-end broadband network in 30 U.S. markets, using its licenses in the 28 and 38 GHz spectrum. (Note these wireless services are LMDS.)
***WinStar Achieves Access Rights to More Than 4,200 Commercial Buildings Nationwide (December 17)
WinStar Communications announced it has obtained access rights to more than 4,200 commercial buildings nationwide, exceeding its 1998 goal. WinStar also reported it has signed an agreement with Spieker Properties, L.P. to provide access to Spieker commercial office buildings in Los Angeles, San Francisco and the Bay Area, Seattle and San Jose to WinStar's broadband network. Since the beginning of the current quarter, WinStar has acquired access rights to approximately 700 commercial office buildings nationwide, giving WinStar a run rate of 2,800 new buildings as it enters 1999. These rights enable WinStar to provide a building's tenants with a wide range of integrated Wireless FiberSM services, including local and long distance service, Internet access and high-speed data services. WinStar said today it would continue its building-centric marketing efforts, and expects to obtain access rights to a total of 8,000 buildings nationwide by year-end 1999.
The agreement with Spieker Properties, one of the largest publicly-traded real estate investment trusts, gives WinStar access to a portfolio of over 600 commercial office and industrial buildings that currently exceeds 40 million square feet. WinStar expects to provide Wireless Fiber services within the next 24 months to approximately 250 of these buildings. Of the 600 Spieker buildings, WinStar has included 250 in its building count for the quarter.
WinStar provides these Wireless Fiber services over its own end-to-end broadband network in 30 U.S. markets, using its licenses in the 28 and 38 GHz spectrum.
In the wireless microwave point to point line of sight transmission business having access to buildings at the roof top is the gateway for signal delivery. It is just the opposite with fiber or cable - where the basement counts. WinStar has gotten very aggressive in securing buildings which gives them direct access to the occupants.
***Liberty Cellular To Trial LMDS Network In Kansas (December 15)
Newsbytes reports that Liberty Cellular appears to be the first cellular operator in to offer a LMDS (local multipoint distribution system) network in the US. The wireless operator has signed a deal with Nortel Networks for its LMDS technology.
While Teligent (another LMDS operator) already has LMDS trial networks operational in several metro areas of the US, including New York, San Francisco and Dallas, Liberty is the first wireless operator to go with LMDS technology.
Liberty is diversifying its network to support the 28/31 GHz wireless broadband technology. LMDS operates at distances of up to several miles from a base station, and it has data rates as high as a gigabit per second (Gbps). The technology is actually a simpler development of MMDS (multichannel multipoint distribution service), but has caused some confusion in the marketplace, for the simple reason that few operators have found a real market for such a massive bandwidth.
Proponents of the technology argue, however, that since LMDS is wireless, quick to deploy and has a much higher data capacity than DSL (digital subscriber line) technologies, it has a significant future.
A LMDS network is a transparent data communications medium, since it looks and feels like wireline, except that the quality and data speed. LMDS is actually a packet-based data transmission technology, with users being connected to a hub-in this case a base station-which services between 20 and 30 small business users, or perhaps one or two major organizations, depending on data volumes.
According to Liberty Cellular, which won 28 GHz and 31 GHz licenses in the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) auction of LMDS radio spectrum earlier this year, the company plans to use the technology to deliver voice and data services to customers across Kansas next year. Following a trial, expected to begin early next year, Liberty says it plans a full commercial network deployment later in the year.
***MPEG-4
Authoring Tools Surface
(December 10)
Sarnoff Corporation has announced object-based authoring tools for MPEG-4 video. These new tools let creators of video for display, broadcast, or the Web add still or moving objects and do other editing of compressed video in real time on a standard PC. They will be marketed to hardware or software providers for inclusion in video editing packages targeted at professionals and consumers. The tools are fully compliant with the new official draft standard of MPEG-4, as finalized on October 16, 1998 by the ISO Moving Pictures Expert Group (MPEG).
The Sarnoff technology supports such functions as
· Drag-and-drop of video objects into a file while resizing the objects or adapting them to different frame rates, speeds, transparencies, and layers
· Substitution of a different background
· Mixing natural image and video objects with computer-generated synthetic texture and animation video objects and
· Metadata, editing, indexing and search of compressed image and video objects.Nothing was said about the availability of the tools.
***FCC Lays Down Fees for Ancillary Use of Digital Spectrum on DTV Broadcasters (December 16)
The FCC through a Report & Order has set a fee of five percent of gross revenues received from ancillary or supplementary services for which DTV licensees receive specified compensation from third parties. This requires the Commission to establish a program to assess and collect fees for digital television (DTV) licensees' use of DTV capacity for the provision of ancillary or supplementary services. The statute requires the imposition of a fee where DTV licensees use their capacity for services for which the payment of a subscription fee is required or where the licensee receives revenues from a third party other than advertising revenues in return for transmitting material furnished by the third party. Licensees will be required to annually report to the Commission whether they provided ancillary or supplementary subject to a fee and the amount of fees to be paid to the Commission. The effective date is January 15, 1999.
This is a very important announcement that directly relates to the use of spectrum the broadcasters get for HDTV broadcasts. The FCC, through the ruling, states that the broadcasters must pay 5% of their gross income for the use of the spectrum. This will directly effect how the broadcasters relate to spectrum usage because if it is not profitable they must pay the FCC irrespective of the profitability. Thus, the risk adverse broadcasters are likely to think twice before venturing into risk sharing ventures.
***ANADIGICS Joins Bluetooth Special Internet Group (December 17)
ANADIGICS has become an early adopter of Bluetooth wireless technology by joining the organization's special interest group (SIG). Bluetooth is a technical specification for short-range 2.4 GHz radio links between mobile personal computers and other portable devices such as cellular phones, portable digital assistants, and digital cameras.
Once developed, this global standard will allow users to download information from cellular telephones without the use of cabling. Originally founded by Ericsson, IBM, Intel, Nokia, and Toshiba, the Bluetooth Initiative now boasts more than 200 member companies.
Founded in 1985, ANADIGICS is a pioneer in the manufacture of gallium arsenide integrated circuits for high volume communications applications. ANADIGICS components are the enabling technology for many of today's products used in consumer electronic applications, including mobile telephones, cable television set-top boxes and distribution networks, fiber-optic data transmission systems, and other advanced communications networks. To date, ANADIGICS has delivered over 100 million GaAsICs and was the first GaAsIC manufacturer to receive ISO 9001 Certification.
***Spatial Technology and Modularis Software GmbH Announce ACIS-Enabled StarVars Systems (December 17)
Spatial Technology and Modularis Software GmbH announced today that Modularis has implemented ACIS in their StarVars 2000 and StarVars Explorer software systems. ACIS enabled StarVars 2000 is a toolkit for the development and maintenance of digital parts catalogs, which can be published on Internet servers or on CD-ROMs.
With the ACIS 3D modeling kernel within StarVars 2000, users can use ACIS SAT models of parts and manufacturers' components for inclusion in their catalogs.
ACIS enabled StarVars Explorer incorporates the ACIS 3D modeling kernel's OpenGL graphic interaction component and the ACIS Precise Hidden Line Husk. StarVars Explorer lets users display and generate components and parts created in ACIS enabled StarVars 2000. ACIS's graphic interaction component has an interface to OpenGL that provides StarVars Explorer with powerful real-time rendering and viewing capabilities. Users can move and rotate 3D models to obtain a visual display from various viewpoints. The ACIS Precise Hidden Link Husk provides StarVars Explorer with the functionality to detect and remove hidden lines in solid, surface, and wireframe 3D models of parts, while maintaining the precision of geometry.
Founded in April 1997, Modularis Software GmbH (Bavaria, Germany) has become a leading developer of CAD solutions and Internet software applications. Modularis specializes in the development and marketing of CAD-independent software systems for standard parts and manurfacturers' component catalogs. The company's StarVars line of software includes ACIS enabled StarVars 2000, ACIS enabled StarVars Explorer, and StarVars LIBS - a CAD-independent 2D/3D database of more than 10 million standard
parts, symbols, and component catalogs. The ACIS enabled StarVars 2000 system generates digital supplier part catalogs which can store CAD-system neutral 2D, 3D, and non-geometric models of parts. It's system library of parts can be seamlessly integrated into existing traditional or electronic, non-interactive catalogs and can also complement existing data with additional geometric CAD data.Modularis also offers MODULARIS 98, a MCAD program that allows design engineers to quickly produce 2D and 3D manufacturing drawings with a few simple commands. MODULARIS 98 interfaces with ACIS enabled AutoCAD and Mechanical Desktop, by Autodesk, Inc. and ACIS enabled MegaCAD, by Megatech Software GmbH.
***Virtual Technology Announced Y2K Killer App VTC Software Program (December 17)
Virtual Technology announced an agreement to provide distribution for the software program "GoBack." The program is a Y2K killer application that will mitigate Year 2000 problems with personal computers. The software protects a computer user from data loss of any type, from user errors and software problems, to file recoveries or overwritten files. It allows the user to go back and bring the past forward.
For example, if the user's computer stopped working correctly, the user could simply type in the time and date that it had worked last and GoBack would entirely revert the hard drive to that previous state or retrieve specific files to take the computer back to that time.
Data Protection Features:
*Reverting the hard drive to an original form prior to the
installation of new software or before a crash
*Viewing the hard drive back in time to access and retrieve
files that have since been overwritten or deleted - the entire
drive is re-created via a "virtual" drive
*Recovering old versions of modified/deleted files through
Windows Explorer or the File Recovery Window
*Recovering major system problems including those time when a
computer is unable to boot naturally
GoBack works with Windows 95/98 and an NT version is expected in
mid-1999. System requirements
· 486 or higher IBM/IBM compatible PC, 16MB minimum of RAM, 256 color VGA or better, CD-ROM.GoBack is available for a suggested retail price of $69.95.
***VideoServer
Collaborates with IBM
(December 18)
VideoServer announced an initiative with IBM for distance learning. Under the agreement, IBM will provide marketing and development support to VideoServer for an e-commerce enabled distance learning version of its Encounter family of IP-based multimedia conferencing products.
The Encounter products will be bundled with the IBM Enterprise Suite for Windows NT and IBM Net.Commerce. The products will support live, interactive collaboration with audio, video, and data for use via intranets and switched digital networks.
The IBM and VideoServer bundle will facilitate multimedia applications for distance learning and will deliver features such as tracking and charge-back capabilities not found in traditional conferencing offerings. Applications include face-to-face student project reviews, presentations and digital lectures, and educational certification for such professions as doctors, lawyers, human resource professionals, and CPAs.
VideoServer's Encounter family includes the Encounter NetServer, a multimedia conference server for IP-based conferencing applications, the Encounter NetGate, a gateway server connecting ISDN and IP conferencing endpoints, and the Encounter Gatekeeper, for facilitating management and control of conferences.
The IBM Enterprise Suite for Windows NT will provide collaboration, data and systems management, communications and transaction serving and back-up and recovery. The IBM Net.Commerce will provide the payment vehicle system.
This bundled solution is scheduled to be available in early 1999 through VideoServer and IBM distribution channels.
***WirelessReady Alliance Saddles up for Wireless Data' Future (December 16)
Communications Today reports that Sierra Wireless has begun a multi-vendor plan to develop and deliver what it is calling "complete and compelling wireless data solutions." The company has formed the WirelessReady Alliance, a program uniting leading suppliers of mobile computing hardware, software developers and service providers.
Seventeen companies have signed on with Sierra Wireless in WirelessReady Alliance, through which they will bring to bear their particular strengths and specialized knowledge of wireless data. A key participant is WirelessKnowledge LLC, the "application service provider" that Qualcomm Inc. and Microsoft recently announced as a joint venture.
Via password-protected Web pages, alliance members can receive industry news and updates on wireless data. They also receive wireless-related sales, marketing, technology, and product support, drawing from other members' expertise. At their option, members can submit product prototypes for interoperability testing as a step towards pre-launch design validation and eventually a "WirelessReady" certification.
Beside Sierra Wireless and WirelessKnowledge, the alliance's members are:
In the hardware category:
Casio Inc., Compaq Computer Corp., Hewlett Packard Co., Itronix Corp., Melard Technologies Inc., Sharp Electronics Corp., Telxon Corp.In the software category:
Cerulean Technology Inc., Data Broadcasting Corp., Mobile Data Solutions Inc., MobileForce Technologies Inc., Nettech Systems Inc.Service providers category:
AT&T Wireless Services Inc., Bell Atlantic Mobile, Wireless Telecom Inc.Integrator category:
Paradigm4 Inc.
***EWallet Announced 100,000th Download of its Program (December 17)
eWallet has announced that over 100,000 consumers have downloaded the eWallet program since its launch three weeks ago. eWallet allows customers to make safe, secure purchases on the Web with one mouse click. The eWallet is available for free and is stored on a user's PC. It is compatible with all existing credit/debit cards.
How it works:
Consumers entering their billing/shipping information in their eWallet once, eliminating the need to reenter the information every time they visit a new online shopping site. Once they encounter a checkout screen at an e-commerce site, they click on their wallet, enter a PIN and drag the credit card of choice over to the form. All of the credit/shipping information is then entered automatically and instantly.Consumers can also query several search engines directly from the eWallet task bar, which resides at the bottom of a PC screen.
eWallet requires Microsoft Windows 95/98 and works with either Netscape Navigator/Communicator 4.0 or higher and Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 or higher.
***U.S. Online Business Trade will Soar to $1.3 Trillion by 2003 (December 17)
Forrester Research estimates the U.S. business trade on the Internet will grow from $43 billion in 1998 to $1.3 trillion in 2003. This will surpass 9% of total U.S. business sales.
According to Forrester, online business trade will find its way into all U.S. business supply chains over the next five years, although not all industries will adopt iCommerce at the same rate. Today's leaders - the computing and electronics industries - are achieving significant gains from Internet-based trading with nearly $20 billion in online sales expected in 1998.
By 2003, the leading industries will include aerospace and defense, petrochemicals, utilities, and motor vehicles. Industry adoption of Internet commerce will be driven by the network effect, in which the value of participation increases dramatically as more and more companies join in. Internet trading initiatives generally start small, as early adopters use their industry clout to pull suppliers and customers online. Once these companies realize the efficiencies of Internet trading, they will persuade their business partners to join them online. As industry supply chains incorporate Internet trading, industry leaders will shift the iCommerce boundaries to more complex business processes like customer service.
As Internet commerce takes hold, industry dynamics will undergo fundamental changes. Market-clearing prices will become the norm in many commodity markets as prices reflect real-time supply and demand. Where demand drives production, iCommerce will reward partners that make process improvements and winnow out inefficiencies. But the most dramatic impacts of iCommerce will be felt on the distribution side of supply chains, as companies seek differentiation by offering innovative services.
In mid-1997, Forrester predicted that U.S. Internet business trade would reach $327 billion by 2002. In the subsequent 18 months, the growth of Internet-based business trade has outstripped that projection. One of the major factors in the new forecast is recent research indicating that the United States has entered the commerce threshold - an 18 to 24 month building period preceding 5 to 10 years of Internet commerce hypergrowth. Forrester believes that the computing and electronics industries have already entered hypergrowth, and several others are set to follow.
For the report, "Resizing Online Business Trade," Forrester developed an in-depth model of intercompany trade in the United States from 1998 to 2003. The model analyzed the supply chains of 13 tangible goods industries using input from industry associations, U.S. government census data, and interviews with executives from more than 80 firms. Forrester defines iCommerce as the trade of goods and services in which the final order is placed over the Internet.
***Herschel Shostek Associates Publishes Study on Strategic Implications of Computing and the Internet on Wireless (December 17)
Herschel Shostek Associates announced its study, The Strategic Implications of Computing and the Internet on Wireless: The Competitive Blur Through 2008. The study analyzes how the "data over wireless" proposition is coming to fruition and how it will alter and affect technology, marketing, value chains, distribution channels, billing, and more.
The foundation of the analysis is the value chain - the interconnected group of industry participants that collectively create value for end-users. If technologies or services are to succeed, they must deliver financial or operational value at every stage of the chain.
The study analyzes how the applications for wireless data access will relate to portability - not mobility. User interaction with a device in a "portable model" need not be directly tied to use of a network - wired or wireless. The firm assesses that this will hold profound implications for terminal design, network design, marketing, billing and other aspects of the wireless business.
The Shosteck study also analyzes how added value services and applications will emerge from third party software developers. These applications, the firm notes, will be available through seamless access to the Internet - without mediation from the network operator. This undercuts the control of revenues which network operators had assumed they would gain by delivering content. Without controlling content, network operators remain only the conduits of content.
Traditional terminal manufacturers will face many challenges as a result of the evolution to IP networks. The concept of a terminal on a wireless data network will change. As the industry moves toward a "portable" model, virtually anything can become a wireless terminal.
The study analyzes how key segments of the wireless industry are at risk of being devalued and present strategies for finding new value in the future wireless market.
It rates the relative positioning of top infrastructure and terminal manufacturers and how they may fare against newcomers to the wireless industry such as Cisco, Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, 3Com, among others who come from the computing industry.
***@Home Network Acquires Narrative Communications for Approximately $89 Million (December 18)
@Home Network announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Narrative Communications. At the closing date of the transaction, valued at approx. $89 million at @Home's closing price on December 17, 1998, Narrative will become the Enliven Business Unit of @Home Network. The closing of the transaction is subject to several conditions, but is expected to occur in late December 1998 or early January 1999.
The acquisition will support the market for Internet advertisements. Ads created with the Enliven advertising technology deliver value to both advertisers and consumers through multimedia, interactive, and commerce capabilities, and campaign tracking and reporting.
The combination of @Home's broadband marketplace leadership and the adoption of Narrative's Enliven services and technology creates an opportunity to accelerate the evolution of the Internet as the prevalent advertising, direct marketing, and commerce medium.
Narrative's management, employees and offices will remain largely unchanged, and will continue to serve its existing customer base of advertisers and agencies in delivering campaigns across a wide range of publishing sites, platforms, and connection speeds.
Under the terms of the merger agreement, @Home will acquire all outstanding shares and assume all outstanding options and warrants of Narrative in exchange for 1.34 million to 1.55 million shares of @Home common stock, based on the closing price of the stock.
Narrative's Enliven Services is a complete set of end-to-end network and professional service offerings that provides advertisers with one-stop access to all the tools required to create, deliver, measure, and manage highly interactive multimedia Web ad campaigns. Enliven Services includes ad production consulting, campaign hosting, site acceptance management, consolidated campaign reporting and measurement, and technical support services. All Enliven Services support Macromedia Director authoring, enabling advertisers to leverage existing skills and creative assets.
Narrative's mission is to enable customers and partners to improve the effectiveness of online advertising, and drive the success of the rich media advertising market, by making Enliven the standard Web advertising solution. The company develops and markets a complete set of offerings that combine Web advertising technologies with comprehensive ad delivery, measurement, and transactional services, enabling businesses to increase the effectiveness of their online branding, direct marketing, and electronic commerce campaigns. Narrative has a net loss of approx. $5.7 million on revenue of approx. $250,000 in 1997 and anticipates a comparable net loss in 1998 on revenues approx. three times those of 1997.
***Brooktrout Technology Acquires Lucent Technologies' Computer Telephony Products Business (December 17)
Brooktrout announced it has acquired the Computer Telephony Products (CTP) business of Lucent Technologies for $29.4 million in cash. The CTP business provides technologies for the voice processing industry and manufactures hardware and software components that connect PCs and LANs with telephone networks.
CTP, based in Los Gatos, California, employs approx. 100 employees and will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Brooktrout Technology. It will continue to operate from its current facilities. Kenneth Lavine, former president of CTP, will become president of BrookTrout technology's Los Gatos division. Prior to this acquisition, CTP was part of Lucent Technologies Octel Messaging Division, which was formed in 1997 through Lucent's acquisition of Octel Communications. CTP sells its products through telephone switch manufacturers, computer telephony value added resellers and developers, and distributors. Lucent will remain a key customer of Brooktrout's.
Brooktrout Technology and CTP have complementary product lines and development efforts in voice, fax and data, three primary technology sectors of the electronic communication market. This acquisition positions Brooktrout Technology as a single-source provider offering its customers a broad line of voice, fax and data products. Brooktrout Technology's customers - service providers, system OEMs and VARs - can now offer fast-emerging applications such as unified messaging and response, digital recording, IP telephony, open systems remote access and call center CTI.
The acquisition will be accounted for as a purchase. Accordingly, Brooktrout expects to allocate the purchase price to the assets acquired based upon an independent appraisal of their fair value. Based on preliminary information available to Brooktrout, it anticipates that the impact of the transaction will be to reduce its fourth quarter 1998 earnings by approximately $11.5 to $13.6 million (approximately $7.3 to $8.7 million after tax benefits, or approximately ($0.63 to $0.75 per share) reflecting primarily the anticipated allocation of purchase price to in-process research and development efforts as well as other merger related charges. This anticipated allocation and other merger related charges are preliminary and are subject to finalization and could change.
***Matsushita, Mitsubishi Tie up on Chip Development (December 18)
Kyodo News reports that two Matsushita group companies and Mitsubishi Electric have reached a comprehensive tie-up agreement over advanced semiconductors. The deal includes joint development by Matsushita Electric and Mitsubishi of "system on a chip" devices, or system LSIs, integrating dynamic random access memory, microcomputer, and other functions.
The agreement is aimed at reducing costs and shortening the development period. The three firms will invest a total of 50 billion yen over five years for joint of system LSIs with line widths of 0.15 micrometer and of 0.13 to 0.10 micrometer. The amount will be split equally between the Matsushita side and Mitsubishi.
As the Matsushita side and Mitsubishi have already started separate programs to develop 0.15 micrometer system LSIs, they will exchange a total of some 100 engineers to share their achievements so far in a bid to introduce practical products in fiscal 2000.
For 0.13 to 0.10 micrometer products, the three companies will jointly run trial production processes. Business tie-ups are expected to increase among Japanese semiconductor makers as they are hit hard by falling prices of memory chips. Toshiba Corp. and Fujitsu Ltd. agreed earlier to jointly develop 1-gigabit dynamic random access memory chips.
***Avant!
Intends to Prevail in Court
(December 16)
Avant! Corporation has been notified that the Santa Clara County Criminal Grand Jury returned an indictment charging the company and eight individuals with offenses stemming from the allegation in its longstanding intellectual property dispute with Cadence Design Systems. This indictment is based on the same allegations made by Cadence three years ago and the Santa Clara County District Attorney 18 months ago.
"The indictment is only an unproven charge that charges nothing about the facts of this case," said David Stanley, Avant!'s General Counsel. "This case continues to be about a business dispute that has been elevated into a criminal matter by a competitor who is being beaten fair and square in the marketplace by a superior Avant! Technology. We are determined to defend the reputation of our company and our employees. We remain confident Avant! Will prevail in the courtroom once all the facts are presented."
"Avant!'s fundamental strength in the marketplace will not be affected by today's expected events," said Avant! President and DEO Gerald C. Hsu. "Avant! Is in the same position today as Avant! was in yesterday: Our technologically superior products and customer-focused service continues to surpass the competition. And the rehashed allegations against Avant! are the ones raised three years ago by our main competitor, Cadence. We will continue to prevail in the market, and we expect vindication when the facts are heard in a court of law."
An indictment is only a charge that brings a case to trial. It is not a determination of guilt. The indictment alleges conspiracy to commit trade secret theft, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, theft of trade secrets, inducing trade secret theft and committing a fraudulent practice in connection with the offer or sale of a security. The Avant! employees named in the indictment are Gerald C. Hsu, chairman, president and CEO, Stephen Wuu, Y.Z. Liao, and Eric Cheng. Avant! categorically denies each and every one of these charges.
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