Award Software International Inc. was a BIOS manufacturer founded in 1983 by Rene Vishney and Bob Stillman in San Jose, California. In 1984, the company moved its international headquarters to Los Gatos, California, United States.
History
In 1988, Bob Stillman left the company. The company was held privately by Rene Vishney (chairman of the board) and his wife, Deborah Lee (Marlow) Vishney (Chief Executive Officer).
By 1990 Award BIOS reportedly led among Asian PC clone makers, ahead of Phoenix Technologies's Phoenix BIOS. In 1993, Award was sold to Taiwan company GCH Systems Ltd. (now defunct).
On 24 October 1996, Award Software International Inc. announced its initial public offering.
On 16 June 1997, Award Software International Inc. announced the acquisition of BIOS upgrades provider Unicore Software, Inc. making it a subsidiary of Award.
On 16 April 1998, Phoenix Technologies and Award Software International Inc. announced the completion of a definitive merger agreement where Phoenix Technologies Ltd. would become the surviving corporate entity following the merger completion on 30 June 1998. The merger was completed on 28 September 1998.
Subsidiaries
- Award Software Europe
- Award Software Hong Kong, Ltd
- Award Software Japan, KK: Established in 1997-06-03.
- Award Software International, Inc.
- Unicore Software, Inc.
Products
- AwardBIOS: It is a BIOS developed by Award Software, and later Phoenix Technologies.
- Note:Even after the merger was completed in 1998 it continued to still attribute copyright to Award Software, Inc., until around 2001-2002 was started to be copyrighted to Phoenix Technologies Ltd., while BIOSes on motherboards manufactured by GIGABYTE Technology still copyrighted to former, until he switched to AMI Aptio UEFI by end of 2012
- CardWare: It is a PC Card software product.
- EliteBIOS: It is the system management software product that Award Software designs, develops and markets to the manufacturers of desktop, server, mobile and embedded systems.
- PC DIAG: Diagnostic software
- CheckIt POSTcard: Power On Self Test system diagnostic board
- ISA POSTcard: ISA Diagnostic hardware
- PCI POSTcard: PCI Diagnostic hardware
- Preboot Manager
- SMSAccess: System management software suite
- DMIAccess: Desktop Management Interface utilities
- LMAccess: Microsoft Windows NT and Windows 95-based hardware status monitoring and alarm application
- MPCAccess
- RPBAccess: Remote, preboot diagnostic and repair software
- USBAccess: It is a USB-host software targeted for consumer electronics and embedded device manufacturers.
- WWWAccess: Product suite for Internet appliance applications using Intel x86 embedded design.
- APIAccess: Integrates Win32 applications into real-time systems. Formerly Willows Toolkit for UNIX and Willows RT for Embedded Systems from Willows Software.
See also
- BIOS features comparison
References
External links
- Official website at the Wayback Machine (archived 1997-10-23)
- Award Software has merged with Phoenix Technologies (archive)
- Unicore Software, Inc. (archive)
- Archives of Award Taiwan website (English)
- Taiwan Venutures Capital Corp · SC 13G · Award Software International Inc · On 2/14/97
- Archives of AwardBIOS motherboard download page
