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1/24 LA Times business section said IBM stopped funding Chen's supercomputer project.

I just got this from someone in Eau Claire....

Quotes from the interview/press conference on WAYY, a local
radio station in Eau Claire. It pretty much confirms what I said earlier.


PREPARED ANNOUNCEMENTS

Steve Chen, President/Founder SSI
  - "Unable to secure additional funding"
  - "No alternative but to terminate the project"
  - IPO -- "cannot find investment banker willing to offer stock"
  - They are closing the doors, but will continue to pursue all funding
    possibilities. But he says, "after 2-3 weeks, it will be too late to 
    reverse the path we're now embarking on."

Adam Shear, Exec. VP of SSI
  - "have exhausted all funding"
  - Require $60 Million outside funding in 1993 to cover remaining 
    development and manufacturing ramp-up.
  - "We are AHEAD of the schedule put together two years ago."
  - It is possible that they can still get funding, but "we're not optimistic."
  - Employees will recieve benefits for 60 days, and wages for all vacation 
    accruals.
  - 320 employees (300 in Eau Claire), primarily engineering/technical
  - annual payroll = $15 million
  - "Employees were told that we're closing and ceasing all operations."
  


QUESTION/ANSWERS FROM THE PRESS

Steve Chen, President/Founder SSI
  - "2.5 ns benchmark shows that we've created the world's fastest computer"
  - "We do have a buyer ... commercial/government"
  - "We're a little behind the 5-year schedule, but accomplished more than
     planned"

Adam Shear
  - "We had expected to ship our first computer in October 1993"
  - "We have a number of patents"
  - "Highly unlikely that the 300 Eau Claire employees will find new
     employment in this area"
  - SS1 is 4-32 processors with entry price of $10 million
-- 
Bob Bownes, aka iii - "Fork twice to avoid zombies"
Warning: This may contain opinions. They belong to me, not to Aule-Tek, 
Sun Microsystems, General Electric or anyone else. But you can rent them. 

Tuesday's (1/26/93) New York Times had an article about the demise of Steve
Chen's company Supercomputer Systems. Some interesting points of the article
are included below.

 . "... Steve S. Chen said today that he was abandoning the project and closing
    his company."

 . "Mr. Chen said that he was closing his factory and laying off his employees
    today. But he said he would continue for several weeks to search for
    additional support, .."

 . "Mr. Chen's company said today that it needed an additional $60 million to
    complete development of its machine and begin manufacturing."

 . "Several executives involved in the project said the computer maker had been
    spending approximately 5$ millon a month recently,...They said that I.B.M.'s
    financial difficulties were not the reason the computer maker had decided to
    end its financing of Mr. Chen's project. Instead it was the continued lack
    of clear evidence that a working machine would emerge soon that led I.B.M.
    to close its purse."

 . The article went on to describe what it saw as the tightening competition
   among conventional supercomputers, massively parallel supercomputers and work
   stations capable of near-supercomputing speeds.

Th-th-th-that's all f-f-f-folks,

+---------------------------+--------------------------------------------+
| Larry Yeagley             |          Cogito, ergo cogito sum.          |
| lry1219@cfdd42.boeing.com |                                            |
+---------------------------+--------------------------------------------+
|  The advice, opinions and mistakes expressed here are my own and       |
|  certainly not Boeing's.                                               |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Interesting that IBM cited a lack of a machine as a reason to stop funding.
Last I heard there was one on the floor up and running and parts ready to 
put #2 together.

-- 
Bob Bownes, aka iii - "Fork twice to avoid zombies"
Warning: This may contain opinions. They belong to me, not to Aule-Tek, 
Sun Microsystems, General Electric or anyone else. But you can rent them. 

I also find it interesting that IBM cited lack of clear evidence that a working 
machine would emerge that they stopped funding.  A friend that worked at SSI
said they had a machine on the floor and checkout was going great.  Maybe the
rumor from bownes that IBM was in it for the technology was correct.  They were
so close, to  have to hear from investment bankers that the bankers couldn't 
fund them.

Mike

More than one poster noted:
>a machine on the floor

I have always wondered where the thresholds of success are.
More than one company actually delivered 1-2 machines in the field.
A few companies made tens of deliveries, and even Alliant delivered
500 machines or so during its time.  Some still living vendors have yet to
break 100 machines while others have over 1000 delivered.
It is perhaps our perspective of time since it might be that all these
businesses fail in the long run (century or more even).

--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, eugene@orville.nas.nasa.gov
  Associate Editor, Software and Publication Reviews
  Scientific Programming
  {uunet,mailrus,other gateways}!ames!eugene
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