Banyan Systems, Inc., was founded in 1983 by Anand Jagannathan, a software engineer and mid-level manager at

Data General Data General Corporation was an early minicomputer firm formed in 1968. Three of the four founders were former employees of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). Their first product, 1969's Data General Nova, was a 16-bit minicomputer intended to ...

, Larry Floryan and David C. Mahoney. The company's distinctive logo was a

Banyan A banyan, also spelled banian ( ), is a fig that develops accessory trunks from adjacent prop roots, allowing the tree to spread outwards indefinitely. This distinguishes banyans from other trees with a strangler habit that begin life as ...

tree and the logo's allegorical representation was of Banyan's product suite,

Banyan VINES Banyan VINES is a discontinued network operating system developed by Banyan Systems for computers running AT&T's UNIX System V. ''VINES'' is an acronym for ''Virtual Integrated NEtwork Service''. Like Novell NetWare, VINES's network services ...

Jim Allchin James Edward Allchin (born 1951, Grand Rapids, Michigan, United States) is an American computer scientist, philanthropist and guitarist best known for being a former Microsoft executive. He assisted Microsoft in creating many of the system plat ...

, although not a founder, was one of the first employees hired. The company was headquartered in

Westboro, Massachusetts Westborough is a New England town, town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 21,567 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, in over 7,000 households. Incorporated in 1717, the town is governed under the N ...

, along the high-tech

I-495 Interstate 495 (I-495) is the designation for the following five Interstate Highways in the United States, all of which are related to I-95: * The Capital Beltway, a beltway around Washington, D.C., running through Virginia, Maryland, and a sliver ...

corridor. Banyan was a privately held entity for nearly ten years after its incorporation. Later the company went public. Subsequently it went into decline, facing competition from

Novell NetWare NetWare is a discontinued computer network operating system developed by Novell, Inc. It initially used cooperative multitasking to run various services on a personal computer, using the Internetwork Packet Exchange, IPX network protocol. The f ...

and even more so from

Microsoft Windows NT Windows NT is a proprietary graphical operating system produced by Microsoft as part of its Windows product line, the first version of which, Windows NT 3.1, was released on July 27, 1993. Originally made for the workstation, office, and server ...

. In 1997, the company changed its name to Banyan Worldwide. In October 1999 Banyan Worldwide became , an internet services company providing collaboration, security and identity management solutions. At the same time, it announced the obsolescence of VINES and other Banyan products. On October 24, 2003 announced that it would cease operations and its assets would be acquired by

Unisys Unisys Corporation is a global technology solutions company founded in 1986 and headquartered in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. The company provides cloud, AI, digital workplace, logistics, and enterprise computing services. History Founding Unis ...

References

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External links

VINES Protocol
Defunct networking companies Defunct software companies of the United States Unisys