Here's the artcile for those of you who don't have access to Dow Jones.
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08:23 MetaCreations Hopes Intel's Help Will Make New 3D Tech Std
By Sean Davis
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--MetaCreations Corp. (MCRE) wants to provide the technology standard for sending and using three-dimensional graphics over the Internet, and it is counting on a strategic partnership with Intel Corp. (INTC) to help.
The agreement with Intel, which MetaCreations expects to announce soon, is designed to make the technology, MetaStream, an industry standard, said Bob Rice, the general manager of MetaCreations' Princeton, N.J., research office.
Toward that end, Intel and MetaCreations will share some technology, and Intel will provide some marketing assistance, according to Rice. The current agreement doesn't include an equity investment by Intel, Rice said.
MetaCreations, of Carpinteria, Calif., says the streaming technology, which it planned to unveil Monday, could be a boon to World Wide Web-based commerce, popularizing 3D just as other streaming technologies have expanded the presence of audio and video on the Web.
With three-dimensional graphics, the user can see an object in the round, turning it over to see all sides, and moving closer to examine the detail. Engineers and designers already use 3D imaging on sophisticated computers to get a picture of their designs without having to build prototypes. But the technology has been slow to take off on the Internet because of the time it takes to download images.
What sets the MetaCreation technology apart, said Bob Rice, general manager of the company's Princeton, N.J., office, is its scalability. That means users of puny PCs can get almost as much enjoyment from the software as hackers with the latest, greatest hardware.
For a Web site designer at an on-line clothing store, for example, that means being able to assure that a potential customer browsing the Web for a new jacket will be able to view the garment at the same speed, with about the same level of detail, whether he's using the latest Pentium chip or a 386 microprocessor.
MetaCreations won't make money from the MetaStream viewer, a Web-browser add-on that it plans to distribute free over the Internet and through other channels the company isn't disclosing at this time.
What the company hopes to do is create a wide market for its authoring tools, as well as a 3D camera made by Real 3D, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT) and Intel. MetaCreations licenses its software and technology for the camera.
MetaCreations' shares closed Friday at 10 7/16, down 1/16, in Nasdaq
trading.
(END) DOW JONES NEWS 05-04-98 |
