Pyramid Technology Corp, Mountain View, California, has been taking something of a back seat role in telling the world about its newest developments lately: most recently Ing C Olivetti & Co SpA was left to deliver Pyramid’s latest MIPS Computer Systems Inc-based R3000 and R4000MP offerings at its bash in Rome a couple of weeks ago. However, by the end of July, Pyramid will be blowing its own trumpet again, announcing on its own account the top-end systems that Olivetti has already shown with a maximum 24 R3000 processors, two on each board – as the ES server line.
Lobbying furiously
The ES range will effectively double the power of Pyramid’s existing top-end MIServers which come with up to 12 R3000s. Pyramid says it hasn’t decided whether it will offer the one-to-four MIPS R4000MP-based low-end servers (which Olivetti has also announced) in its own catalogue – it will probably let its OEM customers handle those. It would only confuse our already confused image, a Pyramid official said. Although Olivetti has stolen most of Pyramid’s limelight of late, the $100m OEM relationship with the Italian group is matched by a similar agreement that is still in place over at Siemens Nixdorf Informationssysteme AG. The Siemens Nixdorf deal is focused on Pyramid components and its Unix System V.4 implementation, not whole systems per se. But that’s all set to change, according to the company, with the ink now drying on a re-vamped contract which will see Siemens Nixdorf reselling complete Pyramid systems. Siemens Nixdorf, Pyramid says, has made it clear that it is in the process of formulating a long-term policy of its future chips and technology requirements – it seems highly likely that behind the scenes in Munich and Paderborn, Hewlett-Packard Co is lobbying furiously on behalf of its Precision Architecture RISC – with ICL Plc happy in the Sparc camp, Compagnie des Machines Bull SA locked up by IBM Corp with its PowerPC and Olivetti the first major design win for Digital Equipment Corp’s Alpha RISC, Siemens Nixdorf is the only European major who’s open systems product line remains a morass of conflicting systems with no clear unifying strategy. The fact that Siemens Nixdorf has donned the wet towel to ponder its medium term direction is good news according to Pyramid, because it means that the company is likely to get closer to Pyramid in the short term while these issues are being resolved, whatever the eventual outcome.
By William Fellows
Also, while it is desperately trying to stem the flow of red ink it is trailing, going to Pyramid for complete systems is a safe option for Siemens Nixdorf as research and development budgets are being put through the grinder. Under the deal, Pyramid may even end up reselling Siemens Nixdorf’s low-end RM400 box. In reaching 24 processor configurations, Pyramid says it has gone as far as it can with the R3000. Beyond the ES series, there are two further generations of systems already scheduled, which will see the Pyramid range move across to the R4000 RISC in various guises. Pyramid says that it is happy enough with the specifications for MIPS’ next-generation R5000 and R10000 RISC iterations, but says that it will wait until it sees the things before it believes the projections. Looking to expand its business into other growth areas, Pyramid is currently formulating a fault-tolerant strategy that will go beyond its current Reliant series, in which two Pyramid systems are Siamese-twinned to deliver a claimed 99.975% availability. By what route this strategy will proceed – technology swapping (Integrated Micro Products Ltd up in Consett, County Durham reckons it has a pretty nifty answer to any maiden’s fault-tolerant prayer), an OEM agreement or other – is unclear, but the company admits that it probably would have been a good idea had Tandem Computers Inc and Pyramid meshed their respective hardware and Unix software experience in that area two years ago. Pyramid also promises a riposte to arch rival Sequent Computer Systems Inc’s plans to offer Microsoft Corp Windows NT-based superserv
er systems. However it won’t go with NT at the low end, and the plan, if there is one, remains under wraps. In this instance the company concedes that it is lagging well behind Sequent.
Mainframes
Elsewhere, other strategies will roll out in two to three months’ time, Pyramid says, and it claims that in the next year or so, it will have servers that are capable of competing with IBM Corp mainframe-class systems. A company spokesman said he didn’t know whether the company would break even on its business for the fiscal third quarter to June 30, just ended – results are due in a couple of weeks – but an improvement on its second quarter loss of $7.2m (which followed a first quarter that ended $18m in the red) is expected. Revenues from its share of AT&T Co’s $1,400m contract with the Internal Revenue Service in the US will kick in around November, the company says. UK business now accounts for some 30% of the European total. Last year’s business was split 60%-40% between direct and indirect sales, but this year it is expected to level out at 50%-50%, according to Pyramid’s UK managing director, Ken Jacobsen. In the UK, Pyramid is opening an Open Oracle Financials centre at its Farnborough, Hampshire base, and it is supplying hardware to Oracle’s systems integration unit.
