Wyse

Wyse Technology is a manufacturer of thin client hardware and software. It was founded in 1981 by Garwing Wu, Bernard Tse, and Grace Tse. Its headquarters are in San Jose, California.

The company became famous in the 1980s as a manufacturer of character terminals. Most of these terminals can emulate several other terminal types in addition to their native escape sequences. People may recognize these terminals as those used with older library information systems (electronic card catalog). The Wyse 99GT and 160 terminals added graphical capability through Tektronix 4014 emulation.

In 1984, Wyse entered the personal computer marketplace. The first of these was the Wyse 1000, a computer based on the Intel 80186 (which did not see huge volumes due to poor compatibility with the 8088). Next came the WYSEpc, an IBM-compatible computer based on the 8088 processor, which had a good following due to its slim-line design. Later, Wyse introduced personal computers compatible with the IBM AT based on the 80286 and 80386, which were top sellers. Wyse sold through 2-tier distribution, which limited growth in the late 1980s as mail order companies like Dell and Gateway entered the marketplace.

Wyse was also an early innovator in off-shore electronics production with its products being built in Taiwan in company owned facilities. In the late 1990s, the company's primary business was the manufacture of thin clients under the Winterm brand name. Those machines differ from the traditional text-mode terminals that made the company famous in that they support modern GUI applications using a mouse and windowing systems. The clients are able to access these applications using protocols that send drawing commands or raw pixel data (instead of strings of text characters) over the data connection. Because of the greater bandwidth this requires these machines typically use ethernet connections to the server, rather than the RS-232 links used in the past.

In the past few years, Wyse has transitioned into the business of desktop virtualization through partnerships with Citrix, IBM, VMware, Microsoft and others.

Notable employees

David Grus, Philip Graham, Jo Ellen Wagner and Kevin Martin were some of the first engineers working on the WY-1000, and later the WYSEpc. This team had previously worked at Hewlett-Packard in the early 80s, where they worked on HP's first personal computers, such as the HP-150 touch screen computer. Grus is now retired, although Graham and Wagner are at Cisco working on that company's TelePresence range, Graham as the lead.

David Dix worked first on the very first Wyse terminals and later the high end personal computers. David also worked at HP prior to Wyse. Dix is working at ShoreTel.

Current Wyse CTO Curt Schwebke and CMO Jeff McNaught are holders of the first thin client patent

Richard Wales was the lead hardware engineer on the first color terminal, at Wyse known as the WY-350. Wales also worked at HP prior to Wyse, where he worked on the HP-150 touch screen computer. Wales is now at Cisco as the director of engineering for Cisco's TelePresence products.

Tarkan Maner was appointed CEO in February 2007.

Competitors

See also

References

External links

Category:Computer companies of the United States Category:Computer terminals Category:Companies established in 1981 Category:Thin clients