METROWERKS TO ACQUIRE LATITUDE PORTING TECHNOLOGY
CodeWarrior(R) To Be Hosted On Sun Microsystems(R)' Solaris(TM)-based
UNIX(R) Workstations
AUSTIN, Texas--January 27, 1997--Metrowerks Inc. (NASDAQ: MTWKF,
TSE/ME:MWK), one of the world's leading providers of software development
tools, today announced that it had signed a letter of intention to acquire
the principle assets of The Latitude Group, Inc., of Mountain View, Calif.
Latitude's principle assets include a porting library which allows Mac(TM)
OS applications to be ported to UNIX-hosted operating systems, including
Sun Microsystems' Solaris 2.3+, Silicon Graphics(R)' IRIX(TM) 5.2+ and
Hewlett-Packard(R)'s HP-UX(R) 9.03+. The Latitude porting libraries
redirect Mac OS commands to the target operating system, with a UNIX
library containing a portable implementation of the Mac OS API at its core.
Metrowerks will also take over providing the Latitude porting technology to
The Latitude Group, Inc.'s existing clients already under contract.
Metrowerks intends to use the Latitude porting library to port CodeWarrior
to run on Sun Microsystems' Solaris-based UNIX workstations in order to
offer this platform as a host for embedded systems development. Sun's
Solaris-based UNIX workstations are widely used by embedded systems
programmers worldwide.
The Latitude porting libraries will be incorporated in a new product,
CodeWarrior Latitude. CodeWarrior Latitude will continue to support the
UNIX-hosted operating systems outlined above.
Metrowerks also plans to extend CodeWarrior Latitude to enable the port of
Mac OS applications to run on Rhapsody, Apple's Next Generation OS. This
will allow Metrowerks' existing clients to more easily port their existing
applications to Rhapsody.
As part of the agreement between Metrowerks and The Latitude Group, Inc.,
David Hempling, president and CEO of The Latitude Group, Inc., will join
Metrowerks as the technical lead for CodeWarrior Latitude. Mr. Hempling was
a co-founder of Quorum Software Systems Inc., which created Latitude.
"The Latitude porting technology offers Metrowerks a great opportunity to
move CodeWarrior to UNIX," said Jean Belanger, chairman and chief executive
officer. "By offering embedded systems versions of CodeWarrior on Windows,
Mac OS and, now, UNIX, our embedded story will be more compelling than ever.
Implementing support for Rhapsody in CodeWarrior Latitude will allow Mac OS
developers to move their applications to Apple's Next Generation OS much
faster than would otherwise be the case."
Pricing and Availability
Metrowerks plans to ship CodeWarrior Latitude in the summer of 1997.
CodeWarrior Latitude will include all available targets (Silicon Graphics,
Hewlett-Packard, Solaris and Rhapsody) in one library package and will sell
for $399.
UNIX-hosted versions of CodeWarrior for embedded development will be
available in late 1997.
About Metrowerks
Founded in 1985, Metrowerks develops, markets and supports a complete line
of programming tools for building applications for a number of operating
systems intended for use on desktop computers or embedded systems,
including Mac(TM) OS, Windows(R) 95, Windows NT(TM), PlayStation(TM) OS,
BeOS(TM) and Palm OS(TM), running on a number of microprocessors including
68K, PowerPC(TM), MIPS(TM) and x86 microprocessors. Metrowerks' CodeWarrior
products are used by over 65,000 registered users in 70 countries.
Additional information on Metrowerks and its products is available via
e-mail at "info@metrowerks.com", from our web site at
"http://www.metrowerks.com", or by calling (800) 377-5416 or (512) 873-4700.
Press Contacts:
Cynthia Fray
Media Relations
Metrowerks Inc.
(512) 873-4758
cynthia@metrowerks.com
Alisa Dean
Media Relations
Metrowerks Inc.
(512) 873-4797
alisa@metrowerks.com
