AT&T/EO Purchase PenPoint Developer

EO, Inc., the developer of the EO personal communicators, and the relatively recent new owner of the PenPoint operating system, is beginning to look a bit like Pacman as it gobbled up one of the leading developers of PenPoint software.

PenSoft Corporation, developer of the highly acclaimed Perspective personal information manager and underlying database architecture was acquired by EO for an undisclosed price on December 9, 1993. At the time of acquisition, PenSoft had 16 employees, but as a privately held company, did not release sales figures.

This move follows closely after EO’s much discussed acquisition of GO Corporation last August, especially since it raised questions about support for processors outside of the AT&T Hobbit 92K family. In describing the acquisition, EO President and CEO Alain Rossmann stated that it was indeed PenSoft’s innovative data architecture that attracted EO.

In a more telling statement, David Atkinson, AT&T Consumer Products vice president of personal communications said that: “Through EO we are bringing together the best technology components from companies such as PenSoft, as well as from AT&T Bell Laboratories, to build Personal Communicators that are the next generation of intelligent cellular phones.

What does this mean to customers and ISV’s already using products from PenSoft? According to EO, they will continue to support the licensing of the APIs to the data engine to third party developers. In addition, while EO plans to sell and support the current Intel-based version of the product, they have also made it clear that all of PenSoft’s future development efforts will concentrate on EO devices.

Of the current PenSoft management team, Robert Roblin has accepted a position as VP Marketing at EO, and James Allison will continue as manager of the development team. However, John Zeisler, President and CEO of PenSoft, will pursue other interests after working to complete the merger.

For more information, please contact Sharon Miller, Access Public Relations at (415) 904-7070 (ext. 272).