In 2009 the company became a full subsidiary of the British firm Micro Focus International plc. ==History== ===The 1980s: Foundations=== Borland Ltd.
In the 1980s, companies had few people who understood the growing personal computer phenomenon, and so most technical people were given free rein to purchase whatever software they thought they needed.
was founded in August 1981 by three Danish citizens, Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, and Mogens Glad, to develop products like Word Index for the CP/M operating system using an off-the-shelf company.
Borland Software Corporation was a computer technology company founded in 1983 by Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, Mogens Glad and Philippe Kahn.
from its inception in 1983 until 1995.
Its first product was Turbo Pascal in 1983, developed by Anders Hejlsberg (who later developed .NET and C# for Microsoft) and before Borland acquired the product sold in Scandinavia under the name of Compas Pascal.
According to Philippe Kahn, the mascot first appeared in advertisements and cover of Borland Sidekick 1.0 manual, which was in 1984 during Borland International, Inc.
1984 saw the launch of Borland Sidekick, a time organization, notebook, and calculator utility that was an early terminate and stay resident program (TSR) for DOS operating systems. By the mid-1980s the company had the largest exhibit at the 1985 West Coast Computer Faire other than IBM or AT&T.
A first US IPO followed in 1989 after Ben Rosen joined the Borland board with Goldman Sachs as the lead banker and a second offering in 1991 with Lazard as the lead banker. In 1985 Borland acquired Analytica and its Reflex database product.
With the assistance of John Nash and David Heller, both British members of the Borland Board, the company was taken public on London's Unlisted Securities Market (USM) in 1986.
Adam Bosworth initiated and headed up the Quattro project until moving to Microsoft later in 1990 to take over the project which eventually became Access. In 1987 Borland purchased Wizard Systems and incorporated portions of the Wizard C technology into Turbo C.
Turbo C was released on May 18, 1987.
The TopSpeed compiler technology exists today as the underlying technology of the Clarion 4GL programming language, a Windows development tool. In September 1987 Borland purchased Ansa-Software, including their Paradox (version 2.0) database management tool.
A first US IPO followed in 1989 after Ben Rosen joined the Borland board with Goldman Sachs as the lead banker and a second offering in 1991 with Lazard as the lead banker. In 1985 Borland acquired Analytica and its Reflex database product.
Richard Schwartz, a cofounder of Ansa, became Borland's CTO and Ben Rosen joined the Borland board. The Quattro Pro spreadsheet was launched in 1989 with, at the time, an improvement and charting capabilities.
Brad Silverberg was VP of engineering until he left in early 1990 to head up the Personal Systems division at Microsoft.
Adam Bosworth initiated and headed up the Quattro project until moving to Microsoft later in 1990 to take over the project which eventually became Access. In 1987 Borland purchased Wizard Systems and incorporated portions of the Wizard C technology into Turbo C.
This allowed the developer/user to utilize its products "just like a book"; he or she was allowed to make multiple copies of a program, as long as only one copy was in use at any point in time. ====The 1990s: Rise and change==== In September 1991 Borland purchased Ashton-Tate, bringing the dBASE and InterBase databases to the house, in an all-stock transaction.
During the early 1990s Borland's implementation of C and C++ outsold Microsoft's.
It went through a radical transition in products, financing, and staff, and became a very different company from the one which challenged Microsoft and Lotus in the early 1990s. The internal problems that arose with the Ashton-Tate merger were a large part of the downfall.
A first US IPO followed in 1989 after Ben Rosen joined the Borland board with Goldman Sachs as the lead banker and a second offering in 1991 with Lazard as the lead banker. In 1985 Borland acquired Analytica and its Reflex database product.
This allowed the developer/user to utilize its products "just like a book"; he or she was allowed to make multiple copies of a program, as long as only one copy was in use at any point in time. ====The 1990s: Rise and change==== In September 1991 Borland purchased Ashton-Tate, bringing the dBASE and InterBase databases to the house, in an all-stock transaction.
Microsoft launched the competing database Microsoft Access and bought the dBASE clone FoxPro in 1992, undercutting Borland's prices.
Borland had an internal project to clone dBASE which was intended to run on Windows and was part of the strategy of the acquisition, but by late 1992 this was abandoned due to technical flaws and the company had to constitute a replacement team (the ObjectVision team, redeployed) headed by Bill Turpin to redo the job.
Layoffs occurred in 1993 to keep the company afloat, the third instance of this in five years.
This required new kinds of marketing and support materials from software vendors, but Borland remained focused on the technical side of its products. During 1993 Borland explored ties with WordPerfect as a possible way to form a suite of programs to rival Microsoft's nascent integration strategy.
The eventual joint company effort, named Borland Office for Windows (a combination of the WordPerfect word processor, Quattro Pro spreadsheet and Paradox database) was introduced at the 1993 Comdex computer show.
In October 1994, Borland sold Quattro Pro and rights to sell up to million copies of Paradox to Novell for $140 million in cash, repositioning the company on its core software development tools and the Interbase database engine and shifting toward client-server scenarios in corporate applications.
from its inception in 1983 until 1995.
This later proved a good foundation for the shift to web development tools. Philippe Kahn and the Borland board disagreed on how to focus the company, and Kahn resigned as chairman, CEO and president, after 12 years, in January 1995.
Lynn became interim president and CEO (along with other executive changes), followed by a succession of CEOs including Dale Fuller and Tod Nielsen. The Delphi 1 rapid application development (RAD) environment was launched in 1995, under the leadership of Anders Hejlsberg. In 1996 Borland acquired Open Environment Corporation, a Cambridge-based company founded by John J.
Kahn remained on the board until November 7, 1996.
Borland named Gary Wetsel as CEO, but he resigned in July 1996.
Lynn became interim president and CEO (along with other executive changes), followed by a succession of CEOs including Dale Fuller and Tod Nielsen. The Delphi 1 rapid application development (RAD) environment was launched in 1995, under the leadership of Anders Hejlsberg. In 1996 Borland acquired Open Environment Corporation, a Cambridge-based company founded by John J.
Donovan. On November 25, 1996, Del Yocam was hired as Borland CEO and chairman. In 1997, Borland sold Paradox to Corel, but retained all development rights for the core BDE.
Donovan. On November 25, 1996, Del Yocam was hired as Borland CEO and chairman. In 1997, Borland sold Paradox to Corel, but retained all development rights for the core BDE.
In November 1997, Borland acquired Visigenic, a middleware company that was focused on implementations of CORBA. ===Inprise Corporation era=== In April 1998 Borland International, Inc.
The Silk line was first announced in 1997.
The magazine was republished on April 3, 1997. ===Renaming to Inprise Corporation=== Along with renaming from Borland International, Inc.
In November 1997, Borland acquired Visigenic, a middleware company that was focused on implementations of CORBA. ===Inprise Corporation era=== In April 1998 Borland International, Inc.
In March 1999, dBase was sold to KSoft, Inc.
was renamed to DataBased Intelligence, Inc.). In 1999, Dale L.
At this time Fuller's title was "interim president and CEO." The "interim" was dropped in December 2000.
Keith Gottfried served in senior executive positions with the company from 2000 to 2004. A proposed merger between Inprise and Corel was announced in February 2000, aimed at producing Linux-based products.
The scheme was abandoned when Corel's shares fell and it became clear that there was really no strategic fit. InterBase 6.0 was made available as open-source software in July 2000. In November 2000, Inprise Corporation announced the company intended to officially change its name to Borland Software Corporation.
The legal name of the company would continue to be Inprise Corporation until the completion of renaming process during the first quarter of 2001.
Once the name change was completed, the company would also expect to change its Nasdaq market symbol from 'INPR' to 'BORL'. ===Borland Software Corporation era=== On January 2, 2001, Borland Software Corporation announced it has completed its name change from Inprise Corporation.
Kylix was launched in 2001. Plans to spin off the InterBase division as a separate company were abandoned after Borland and the people who were to run the new company could not agree on terms for the separation.
Borland stopped open-source releases of InterBase and has developed and sold new versions at a fast pace. In 2001 Delphi 6 became the first integrated development environment to support web services.
In late 2002 Borland purchased design tool vendor TogetherSoft and tool publisher Starbase, makers of the StarTeam configuration management tool and the CaliberRM requirements management tool (eventually, CaliberRM was renamed as "Caliber").
All of the company's development platforms now support web services. C#Builder was released in 2003 as a native C# development tool, competing with Visual Studio .NET.
Keith Gottfried served in senior executive positions with the company from 2000 to 2004. A proposed merger between Inprise and Corel was announced in February 2000, aimed at producing Linux-based products.
As of the 2005 release, C#Builder, Delphi for Win32, and Delphi for .NET had been combined into a single IDE called "Borland Developer Studio" (though the combined IDE is still popularly known as "Delphi").
The latest releases of JBuilder and Delphi integrate these tools to give developers a broader set of tools for development. Former CEO Dale Fuller quit in July 2005, but remained on the board of directors.
Former COO Scott Arnold took the title of interim president and chief executive officer until November 8, 2005, when it was announced that Tod Nielsen would take over as CEO effective November 9, 2005.
In the announced reorganization, Borland products would be part of Micro Focus portfolio. ==Subsidiaries== Legadero: In October 2005, Borland acquired Legadero, in order to add its IT management and governance suite, called Tempo, to the Borland product line. Codegear: On February 8, 2006, Borland announced the divestiture of their IDE division, including Delphi, JBuilder, and InterBase.
In the announced reorganization, Borland products would be part of Micro Focus portfolio. ==Subsidiaries== Legadero: In October 2005, Borland acquired Legadero, in order to add its IT management and governance suite, called Tempo, to the Borland product line. Codegear: On February 8, 2006, Borland announced the divestiture of their IDE division, including Delphi, JBuilder, and InterBase.
On March 20, 2006, Borland announced its acquisition of Gauntlet Systems, a provider of technology that screens software under development for quality and security.
On November 14, 2006, Borland announced its decision to separate the developer tools group into a wholly owned subsidiary.
Nielsen remained with the company until January 2009, when he accepted the position of chief operating officer at VMware; CFO Erik Prusch then took over as acting president and CEO. In early 2007 Borland announced new branding for its focus around open application life-cycle management.
In April 2007 Borland announced that it would relocate its headquarters and development facilities to Austin, Texas.
On May 7, 2008, Borland announced the sale of CodeGear division to Embarcadero Technologies for an expected $23 million price and $7 million in CodeGear accounts receivables retained by Borland. ==Products== ===Recent=== The products acquired from Segue Software include Silk Central, Silk Performer, and Silk Test.
In 2009 the company became a full subsidiary of the British firm Micro Focus International plc. ==History== ===The 1980s: Foundations=== Borland Ltd.
Nielsen remained with the company until January 2009, when he accepted the position of chief operating officer at VMware; CFO Erik Prusch then took over as acting president and CEO. In early 2007 Borland announced new branding for its focus around open application life-cycle management.
It also has development centers at Singapore, Santa Ana, California, and Linz, Austria. On May 6, 2009, the company announced it was to be acquired by Micro Focus for $75 million.
The transaction was approved by Borland shareholders on July 22, 2009, with Micro Focus acquiring the company for $1.50/share.
Following Micro Focus shareholder approval and the required corporate filings, the transaction was completed in late July 2009.
It was estimated to have 750 employees at the time. On April 5, 2015, Micro Focus announced the completion of integrating Attachmate Group of companies that had been merged in November 20, 2014.
It was estimated to have 750 employees at the time. On April 5, 2015, Micro Focus announced the completion of integrating Attachmate Group of companies that had been merged in November 20, 2014.
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