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Frog Design Inc. prototype Network Computer

The famous Frog Design Inc was apparently responsible for creating the prototype Network Computer that Oracle Corp's Larry Ellison has been showing off in Japan: seems the company has come up with something it is calling Network Computer Operating System or NC-OS that will run on a family of Internet and World Wide Web devices ranging from television set-top boxes to video phones and pagers; although the initial iteration uses the ARM7500 RISC, and NC-OS appears to be based on Acorn Computer Group Pld's RISC OS, it is being designed to be processor-independent and there will inter alia be a version for iAPX-86-based personal computers, with application portability.

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Larry Ellison said in Japan that Oracle Corp plans to introduce the Oracle Network Computer around September, at a retail price of $495 for its desktop Oracle Network Computer, and $595 for a portable model; he also said that demand for Internet computers with simplified functions would outpace demand for conventional personal computers by the end of the century; Oracle is seeking a licensing agreement with about 20 computer manufacturers worldwide, several of them Japanese; the modem in the first version will run at 28.8Kbps, Oracle says.

By kind permission of Computergram International, Jan 1996

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