Search

Adobe Systems seeks to collaborate with hardware and software vendors to establish its Acrobat document software as the standard for document exchange on the Internet. Adobe, IBM and Netscape Communications will be working together to promote Acrobat by bundling the product with PCs and with Netscape World-Wide Web browser software. Acrobat is being positioned as the solution for publishers wishing to provide online users with electronic documents that closely resemble printed documents in terms of formatting elements, graphics and other embellishments to plain text. Acrobat can be used to encode and decode documents and their associated format elements into a universal document that can be viewed by an online user, regardless of the type of computer they use. Microsoft is also demonstrating its online publishing tools known as Blackbird, which can be used for electronic document transmission on the Microsoft Network online service.

Intel Corp is preparing to sell its 14.25 percent stake in VLSI Technology Inc because the goal of the alliance was to produce microprocessors for hand-held computers, but the market for them has not materialized because of software problems. Some of the software challenges include the inability to reliably recognize handwriting and the lack of an operating system. The companies still plan to ship their Polar microprocessor chip set to a select number of OEMs during summer 1994. Intel's Jul 1992 $50 million investment is worth approximately $105 million based on the closing price of VLSI stock on Aug 4, 1994. Some industry analysts believe the reason Intel originally invested in VLSI was to keep microprocessor manufacturer arch-rival AMD from purchasing the entire company. Such a deal would have given AMD access to VLSI's custom chip design expertise and fab capacity.

Microsoft Corp plans to ship Chicago, the operating system intended as a successor to Windows, by the end of 1994. Chicago is to offer features that facilitate use by first-time microcomputer users. About 100,000 test copies of Chicago will be sent out, in order to guarantee that the software is compatible with an installed base of over 40 million Windows operating-system users. Paul Maritz, Microsoft's senior vice president, confirms that the company is planning to ship a new version of the Windows NT operating system by the end of 2nd qtr, an update that is to include corrections for such problems as the exorbitant amount of memory the program requires to run. The new version, code-named Daytona, can function with about 4Mbytes less RAM.