Prometheus Products, Inc. was an American computer peripheral manufacturer active from 1981 to 1996. The company primarily manufactured

modem A modulator-demodulator or modem is a computer hardware device that converts data from a digital format into a format suitable for an analog transmission medium such as telephone or radio. A modem transmits data by modulating one or more c ...

s and

sound card A sound card (also known as an audio card) is an internal expansion card that provides input and output of audio signals to and from a computer under the control of computer programs. The term ''sound card'' is also applied to external au ...

s for personal computers for the bulk of its existence.

History

Prometheus Products was incorporated in

Fremont, California Fremont is a city in Alameda County, California, United States. Located in the East Bay region of the Bay Area, Fremont has a population of 230,504 as of 2020, making it the fourth most populous city in the Bay Area, behind San Jose, San Fran ...

, in January 1981. The company was founded to capitalize on the

Apple II series The Apple II series (trademarked with square brackets as "Apple ] ''" and rendered on later models as "Apple //") is a family of home computers, one of the first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products, designed primaril ...

of home computers by providing

peripheral A peripheral or peripheral device is an auxiliary device used to put information into and get information out of a computer. The term ''peripheral device'' refers to all hardware components that are attached to a computer and are controlled by th ...

s and other add-on products. In 1984, the company began focusing on the production of

s, following a breakthrough in modem design developed within Prometheus that allowed the relatively inexpensive Intel 8031 to be used as a digital signal processor. This replaced the need for numerous analog devices for signal processing circuits customary in modem design at the time. In 1984, the company's board of directors hired Tom McShane as chairman of the company; he shortly after expanded the company to occupy two buildings, including a production factory and a research and development company, within Fremont. Prometheus was en route to generating $7 million in sales in 1987 and was one of the top 10 modem manufacturers ranked by global sales. Between 1987 and 1989, the company relocated out of state to

Tigard, Oregon Tigard ( ) is a city in Washington County, Oregon, United States. The population was 48,035 at the 2010 census. As of 2007, Tigard was the state's 12th largest city. Incorporated in 1961, the city is located south of Beaverton and north of Tua ...

. In 1992, the company merged with Technology Concepts, Inc., a manufacturer of

fax Fax (short for facsimile), sometimes called telecopying or telefax (the latter short for telefacsimile), is the telephonic transmission of scanned printed material (both text and images), normally to a telephone number connected to a printer o ...

and enhanced voice modems based in

Belmont, California Belmont is a city in San Mateo County in the U.S. state of California. It is in the San Francisco Bay Area, on the San Francisco Peninsula about halfway between San Francisco and San Jose. Known for its wooded hills, views of the San Francis ...

. Prometheus relocated again to

Tualatin, Oregon Tualatin () is a city located primarily in Washington County in the U.S. state of Oregon. A small portion of the city is also located in neighboring Clackamas County. It is a southwestern suburb in the Portland Metropolitan Area that is locate ...

, by early 1994. In early 1994, the company introduced its first series of

s, the Aria 16 (comprising the flagship Aria 16 product and the Aria 16se featuring a

SCSI-2 Parallel SCSI (formally, SCSI Parallel Interface, or SPI) is the earliest of the interface implementations in the SCSI family. SPI is a parallel bus; there is one set of electrical connections stretching from one end of the SCSI bus to the othe ...

connector for connecting to optical drives). The Aria 16 was based on

Sierra Semiconductor PMC-Sierra was a global fabless semiconductor company with offices worldwide that developed and sold semiconductor devices into the storage, communications, optical networking, printing, and embedded computing marketplaces. On January 15, 2016, ...

's Aria sound chipset featuring 32-

polyphony Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture (music), texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompan ...

wavetable synthesis Wavetable synthesis is a sound synthesis technique used to create quasi-periodic waveforms often used in the production of musical tones or notes. Development Wavetable synthesis was invented by Max Mathews in 1958 as part of MUSIC II. ...

and

Sound Blaster Sound Blaster is a family of sound cards designed by Singaporean technology company Creative Technology (known in the US as Creative Labs). Sound Blaster sound cards were the de facto standard for consumer audio on the IBM PC compatible system ...

–compatible

FM synthesis Frequency modulation synthesis (or FM synthesis) is a form of sound synthesis whereby the frequency of a waveform is changed by modulating its frequency with a modulator. The frequency of an oscillator is altered "in accordance with the amplitud ...

. The Aria 16 was bargain priced but received decent reviews from the computer press of its day. Prometheus' sound cards soon found use in prebuilt computer systems manufactured by IBM and DEC. Sales of Prometheus' modems cooled considerably in the early 1990s, the company trailing behind the growing pace of advancements in modem

bit rate In telecommunications and computing, bit rate (bitrate or as a variable ''R'') is the number of bits that are conveyed or processed per unit of time. The bit rate is expressed in the unit bit per second (symbol: bit/s), often in conjunction w ...

s and hampered by quality control issues stemming for slow communication with their Taiwanese manufacturing contract. In October 1994, Sierra Semiconductor purchased Prometheus Products in whole for an undisclosed sum of cash, making the company a subsidiary under Sierra while still operating out of Tualatin. Sierra tasked businessman Jack Murphy, then recently of Practical Peripherals to turn the company around; actions he took included moving the company's manufacturing efforts stateside and shuffling the company's management to included his contacts from Practical Peripherals,

Apple An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple trees are cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus '' Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, where its wild ances ...

, and

Tektronix Tektronix, Inc., historically widely known as Tek, is an American company best known for manufacturing test and measurement devices such as oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and video and mobile test protocol equipment. Originally an independent ...

. These actions were not enough to stem Prometheus' losses immediately, the subsidiary generating $4.6 million in losses on revenues of $19 million by late 1995. In January 1996, Sierra announced the divestiture and sale of Prometheus to the highest bidder.

References

External links

* {{webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/19971008054635/http://www.prometheusproducts.com/, title=Official website, date=October 8, 1997 1981 establishments in California 1980s disestablishments in California 1980s establishments in Oregon 1996 disestablishments in Oregon American companies established in 1981 American companies disestablished in 1996 Computer companies established in 1981 Computer companies disestablished in 1996 Defunct computer companies of the United States Defunct computer hardware companies Graphics hardware companies Modems