Quarterdeck Office Systems, later Quarterdeck Corporation (

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market (; National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the U.S. by volume, and ranked second on the list ...

: QDEK), was an American

computer software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

company. It was founded by Therese Myers and Gary Pope in 1981 and incorporated in 1982. Their offices were initially located at 150 Pico Boulevard in

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and later at 13160 Mindanao Way in Marina del Rey, California, as well as a sales and technical support unit located in

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. In the 1990s, they had a European office in

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. Their most famous products were the Quarterdeck Expanded Memory Manager,

DESQview DESQview (DV) is a text mode multitasking operating environment developed by Quarterdeck Office Systems which enjoyed modest popularity in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Running on top of DOS, it allows users to run multiple programs concurr ...

, CleanSweep, DESQview/X, Quarterdeck

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and Partition-It. On April 18, 1989, Quarterdeck was awarded a US software

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that allowed multiple windowed PC applications under

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few op ...

. After sales and its stock plummeted in 1995, interim CEO King R. Lee hired Gaston Bastiaens as CEO. In order to diversify the company's product offerings, Bastiaens began an ultimately unsuccessful acquisition spree. In 1995, the company acquired Landmark Research International Corp. for 3.5 million shares of Quarterdeck (acquiring MagnaRAM and WinProbe) and then Inset Systems, Inc. of

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in September of that year for 933,000 shares of Quarterdeck (acquiring HiJaak graphics software in the deal). In March 1996, Quarterdeck acquired Datastorm Technologies, Inc., publishers of PROCOMM and PROCOMM PLUS, and relocated its technical support and development operations from

and

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, to Datastorm's

Columbia, Missouri Columbia is a city in Missouri, United States. It was founded in 1821 as the county seat of Boone County, Missouri, Boone County and had a population of 126,254 as recorded in the 2020 United States census, making it the List of cities in Misso ...

headquarters. In July 1996, Quarterdeck acquired Vertisoft Systems, publishers of the DoubleDisk and Fix-It utilities, also for 3.5 million shares of Quarterdeck. Both Landmark and Vertisoft had extensive revenues from direct-marketing of third party products through telemarketing and direct mail. Bastiaens resigned in August 1996, and Quarterdeck continued under acting Co-CEOs King R. Lee, and Anatoly Tikhman, the former CEO of Vertisoft. The company announced a restructuring and a loss, and in January 1997, Quarterdeck hired Curtis Hessler to run the company. In 1998, with its DOS utilities market all but collapsed, Quarterdeck was acquired for $0.52 per share by Symantec (the

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company), which discontinued support of some Quarterdeck products, ''e.g.'', Mosaic, and integrated others into larger offerings, ''e.g.'', CleanSweep, which became part of Norton SystemWorks.

List of software products

* CleanSweep * DESQ, predecessor to DESQview *

(DESQ successor, with IBM TopView compatibility) * DESQview 386 (DESQview that shipped bundled with QEMM 386) * DESQview/X (an X based version of DESQview) * GameRunner * GlobalChat IRC client * GlobalStage IRC server (run on irc.scifi.com until 2003) * HiJaak Graphics Suite * MagnaRAM *

* Partition-It! * Quarterdeck Expanded Memory Manager, formerly QEMM 386 * Quarterdeck InternetSuite * Quarterdeck Message Center * Quarterdeck

* Quarterdeck Sidebar * QRAM, an

Intel 80286 The Intel 80286 (also marketed as the iAPX 286 and often called Intel 286) is a 16-bit microprocessor that was introduced on February 1, 1982. It was the first 8086-based CPU with separate, non- multiplexed address and data buses and also the f ...

-based expanded memory manager * TotalWeb * ViruSweep * Quarterdeck WebAuthor for Word * WebCompass, an early metasearch tool * WebStar (via StarNine) * WebTalk * Files.com

References

External links

Quarterdeck website from June 1997Usenet group for DESQview (via UsenetArchives.com)Floor plan and Pictures of the Quarterdeck Building located in Columbia, Missouri that was purchased by the University of Missouri.
{{Authority control Software companies established in 1982 Defunct software companies of the United States Defunct computer companies based in California Gen Digital acquisitions 1982 establishments in California Software companies based in California