AT&T Microelectronics and GO Corporation Announce Development Relationship

July 13, 1992 — AT&T Microelectronics and GO Corp. Monday made public their relationship to jointly develop products that will be the foundation for an open platform to address the emerging Personal Communicator market.

As part of the agreement, the two companies have been working closely together to optimize GO’s PenPoint mobile operating system for small, communications-oriented devices to run on AT&T Microelectronics’ new line of RISC microprocessors. The announcement was made today at Technologic’s Mobile92 Conference.

In addition, GO and AT&T Microelectronics will work closely with hardware vendors, applications software developers and other communications companies to establish an open platform for Personal Communicators around GO’s PenPoint mobile operating system and AT&T Microelectronics’ RISC processors. Personal Communicators will be truly portable, rich in communications and will integrate voice, data, handwriting recognition, fax, electronic mail, still images and, in the future, full-motion video.

These devices will provide anytime, anywhere communications to a whole new class of business users and consumers who need to constantly “stay in touch.”

“The Personal Communicator represents an emerging class of products that provides a new level of mobility by marry-ing communications and computing,” said William J. Warwick, president of AT&T Microelectronics. “GO is the leading provider of mobile operating system software. We look forward to working closely with GO to develop a powerful new platform that meets the special needs of Personal Communicators, including mobility, ease of use, and management of communications functions,” explained Warwick.

Bill Campbell, president and CEO of GO added, “AT&T is an ideal partner for us in realizing our vision of mobile computing. By combining our expertise in mobile operating system software with the strengths of AT&T, the recognized global leader in communications products and services, we are well positioned to jointly lead the personal communications revolution.”

New Line of RISC Microprocessors Under Development

AT&T Microelectronics is developing a new line of high-performance RISC processors, called Hobbit, specifically for Personal Communicators. The line is optimized for low-power operation to extend battery life, and has many features to support communications. AT&T Microelectronics’ Hobbit microprocessors have been designed to work efficiently with digital signal processors and other technologies required for communications-oriented devices. The Hobbit line will be formally introduced later this year.

In order to focus its efforts on the Personal Communicator segment AT&T Microelectronics has formed a new business unit, Personal Communication Systems (PCS), to develop products for this market. The PCS division, located in Sunnyvale, Calif., is proactively establishing strategic alliances with industry partners, in addition to GO, in order to offer complete solutions for the Personal Communicator market. These alliance organizations all share a common vi-sion and are working towards developing their respective components to make the “mobility revolution” a reality.

GO’s PenPoint to be configured for Personal Communicators

GO’s PenPoint operating system is specially designed to support mobile, communicating devices. Its integrated net-working architecture allows for intermittent connections via wired or wireless links. PenPoint allows multiple simultaneous communications links, and can store and forward messages, files and information when connections are established (or re-established).

GO will enhance PenPoint for Personal Communicators by adding an integrated messaging framework, which will al-low all existing and future PenPoint applications to take advantage of these new features without modification. Through its object-oriented and modular design, PenPoint will be configured for use in devices at a variety of price points, memory configurations and sizes.

AT&T Microelectronics, a multi-billion dollar business unit of AT&T, is a global leader in microelectronics solutions for networked computing, wireless, visual, telecommunications and advanced consumer electronics. The product line is built on strengths in digital signal processing, mobile computing and communications applications. GO Corp., a privately-held company headquartered in Foster City, Calif., develops, markets and supports a mobile operating system and applications designed for mobile users worldwide.

PenPoint is a trademark of GO Corp. Hobbit is a trademark of AT&T Microelectronics.

CONTACT:
AT&T Microelectronics, Burlingame
Kevin Compton, 408/522-4099
or
GO Corp., Foster City
Dayna Deaton, 415/345-7400
or
Regis McKenna Inc.
Kim Tarter, 415/354-4486