According to the press release that just popped into the news inbox, it looks like Castle have bought RISC OS from Pace for an "undisclosed cash sum". Although Pace in return get technical support for existing products and a license for intellectual property rights, it looks like Castle are now the Daddy.
A joint venture with Tematic Ltd has Castle developing desktop RISC OS, and Tematic (remember that name from somewhere kids?) working on embedded RISC OS for a "new generation of smart multimedia products for the high volume consumer electronics market".
This will no doubt throw up a multitude of questions in a number of people's minds, especially with regards to licensing to rival hardware companies, but it seems fitting that the company who picked up the torch with regards to Acorn hardware should now have more of a say in the OS too.
For your discussing pleasure, the full press release has been posted to the hardware forum.
UPDATE (7/7/03) [moss]: Drobe have published an article, On with the show, which has a response from Castle about the deal. And rather excellent it is too.
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Castle buys RISC OS |
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fwibbler (10:31 4/7/2003)
AndrewD (11:11 4/7/2003)
vshears (11:17 4/7/2003)
thegman (12:00 4/7/2003)
Horse (12:14 4/7/2003)
SparkY (14:41 4/7/2003)
John Campbell Rees (17:01 4/7/2003)
Mac (17:09 4/7/2003)
mavhc (17:26 4/7/2003)
ams (18:20 4/7/2003)
Moose (20:13 4/7/2003)
moss (20:26 4/7/2003)
stdevel (21:29 4/7/2003)
John Campbell Rees (22:20 4/7/2003)
pnaulls (22:50 4/7/2003)
John Campbell Rees (09:15 5/7/2003)
Annraoi (AMS) (09:17 5/7/2003)
tim (17:47 5/7/2003)
Ryan Hitch (13:50 6/7/2003)
mavhc (17:00 6/7/2003)
Mark Syder (11:08 26/7/2003)
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fwibbler |
Message #92362, posted by fwibbler at 10:31, 4/7/2003 |
Posts: 320
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Muddy mildred! <fx:spilt tea everywhere> Obvious question is where does this leave RISC OS Ltd?
Where does it leave Select and its users.
Cheers! |
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AndrewD |
Message #92363, posted at 11:11, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92362 |
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I was thinking the same...
I'm also wondering if Castle will be better at marketing the OS to a wider audience. |
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vshears |
Message #92364, posted at 11:17, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92363 |
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Facinating news and overall I think the best outcome we could hope for at this present time. Vic |
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Garry Taylor |
Message #92365, posted by thegman at 12:00, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92364 |
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Castle and ROL might be able to work together with Select, but I think it's MD who will be filling their pants right now. |
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Horse |
Message #92366, posted at 12:14, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92365 |
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Does RISC OS Ltd. retain that exclusive desktop licence for RISC OS 4, and even if they do, does it really matter any more? |
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Gavin Smith |
Message #92367, posted by SparkY at 14:41, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92366 |
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Such good news - I was in awe of Castle when they did the Iyonix, now I'm just worshipping at their feet. |
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John Campbell Rees |
Message #92368, posted at 17:01, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92367 |
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So, RO4 is now officially a dead-end. I give ROL about six months before it becomes a subsidiary of Castle. In a years time, expect to see a cut-down version of RO5 on ROM for RiscPC, with a new versin of Select softloading the modules that don't fit on the ROM. I have great hopes for the partners that Castle have in this deal. They will produce a version of RISC OS which will run on PDA's, laptops and other shiny devices, spreading it way beyond the traditional desktop market. |
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Mac |
Message #92369, posted at 17:09, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92368 |
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For me, the news isn't good, because one of the advantages of RISC OS Ltd was that they could licence the OS to different hardware manufacturers. Therefore creating competition between the different hardware vendors in the market place. |
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Mark Scholes |
Message #92370, posted by mavhc at 17:26, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92369 |
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Because that's worked so well up till now? |
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Annraoi |
Message #92371, posted by ams at 18:20, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92370 |
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Definately this is good news. It means a company whose core interest and business is the RISC OS market (US) has the license. RO may well also get "out and about" so that may not only bring extra income (and fuel further development). It also centralises RISC OS in terms of development (the debacle over the USB API springs to mind). Nope this is definately a good news moment !!!! Regds Annraoi |
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Moose |
Message #92372, posted at 20:13, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92371 |
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This doesn't, and won't, "centralise RISC OS in terms of development". For example, RO5 uses a different USB API than Simtec because Simtec didn't want to use CTL's, for whatever reasons. If you think this will suddenly solve all the problems RISC OS/its companies has ever had, then you're a fool. |
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John Hoare |
Message #92373, posted by moss at 20:26, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92372 |
Posts: 9348
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Of course it won't solve all the problems; not by miles. But it's still a nice bit of good news ;-) |
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Stuart Tyrrell |
Message #92374, posted by stdevel at 21:29, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92373 |
www.stdevel.co.uk
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USB API's: Simtec didn't use the Pace API because they'd already spent the best part of 2 years developing an API which wasn't restricted in the devices it could support (as the Pace API was at the time), and CTL had already publically agreed to use the Simtec API (ref AU news articles). In April 2002 they were offered the Pace API and implementation free of charge by an ex-Pace employee - needless to say they declined..... |
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John Campbell Rees |
Message #92375, posted at 22:20, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92374 |
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So this means that Castle automatically gets its hands on all the improvements made to RO4 for Select. I wonder how quickly these will be incorporated into RO5. |
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Peter Naulls |
Message #92376, posted by pnaulls at 22:50, 4/7/2003, in reply to message #92375 |
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Says who? ROL's developments belong to ROL, no one else. |
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John Campbell Rees |
Message #92377, posted at 09:15, 5/7/2003, in reply to message #92376 |
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I was under the impression that PACE automatically got a copy of the source for anything added to RISC OS by Select, with an option to use it. I assume that this has now passed on to the Castle, as the current owners of RISC OS. If this is teh case, and I emphasise the "IF", then migrating the changes to RO5 should be easier. |
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Annraoi (AMS) |
Message #92378, posted at 09:17, 5/7/2003, in reply to message #92377 |
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Yep, any work ROL put in would be theirs. And Moose if you disagree with my comments, fine, please do so without calling me a fool (it adds nothing to the logic, or otherwise, of your argument). My point about "centralising" was that for a longtime people just did *their own thing* and ROL seemed to have no influence (hence the two USB APIs). In part this may have been because Pace held the IP rights for RISC OS and ROL felt it wasn't fully free to dictate or declare this or that to be a "standard" (in case that might run counter to developments they might get in future from Pace). At least now the license for ROL is in the hands of a company whose future depends on the success of that platform, and perhaps with that will come a more co-ordinated approach to development and improvements to the platform and OS for which we will *all* benefit. Regards Annraoi |
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tim |
Message #92379, posted at 17:47, 5/7/2003, in reply to message #92378 |
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I wonder in what state is the Acorn Java VM and if it will become available again? André |
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Ryan Hitch |
Message #92380, posted at 13:50, 6/7/2003, in reply to message #92379 |
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Little late on the posting I'll grant ya, but a few little things that don't seem to have been mentioned on the forums yet... 1) Will CTL grant ROL a more agreeable license on RO4 - ie. will ROL be able to reduce to sale price of RO4 roms, possibly getting all users back on the same OS version.
2) Did the deal include the Java VM and !Browse - any chance of a browser using combined !Browse and Oregano 2, oh possibily even a proper RISC OS style guide complient version of Oregano 2 (please please!!!)
3) Will Castle have a few RO4 roms ordered and sold on? Bit of competition for ROL. 4) Cor blimey, just thing of all the other things they could do - you'll excuse my excitement, but I was beginning to wonder if the whole market was beginning to stagnate - perhaps this is the catalyst to a new beginning :-) Regards,
Ryan |
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Mark Scholes |
Message #92381, posted by mavhc at 17:00, 6/7/2003, in reply to message #92380 |
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1) How much do you think ROL pays Pace per ROS4 copy? More importantly will Castle allow ROL to sell Select to people without ROS4 thus reducing the entry price? 2) Probably, unlikely, maybe. 3) Unlikely. Their ROS4 is different anyway, a 5th version of ROS for sale would confuse things even more anyway. 4) Indeed. |
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Mark Syder |
Message #92382, posted at 11:08, 26/7/2003, in reply to message #92381 |
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I hope this doesn't mean that Castle will become the Microsoft of the RISC OS world. This could be a great thing, but I'll reserve judgement for the moment. I am an Iyonix owner and would love to see other companies (such as Riscstation) given licences to produce RISC OS 5 computers - our market needs a genuine entry-level computer if it is to survive. The entry-level Iyonix is far too expensive to be genuinely entry-level. |
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