Jaguar to Dominate Atari's Direction (Aug.20,1993)










From: Atari SIG (xx004@cleveland.Freenet.Edu)

Date: 02/19/94-09:02:15 PM Z









From: xx004@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Atari SIG)
Subject: Jaguar to Dominate Atari's Direction (Aug.20,1993)
Date: Sat Feb 19 21:02:15 1994


                            SILICON TIMES REPORT
                            ====================
 August 20, 1993                                                  No. 9.34
 =========================================================================

 - Sunnyvale, CA                JAGUAR TO DOMINATE ATARI'S DIRECTION
   -------------


    For ten years Atari Corp., the company that originated video games, has
 been hunting for a hit product.  Atari's computer offerings are hardly
 known and its hand-held Lynx game machine is selling slowly if at all.

 Hopefully this fall, when Atari launches the Jaguar, a new high powered
 3-D game system it hopes will assist them to achieve total domination of
 Nintendo and Sega and all other video game systems now being developed.
 "Sega, Nintendo. They are the competition we're going after," said Atari
 president Sam Tramiel.

      "We've never believed in launching incrementally better designs. You
 really have to make quantum leaps in performance,"  said Richard Miller,
 Atari vice president for technology, as the company showed off the Jaguar
 for the first time.

      The Jaguar, controlled by buttons on a pad, connects to a tv set and
 runs games in 3-D (simulated). The device will (sometime in the future)
 play audio CDs and Kodak's photo CDs.  Initially, it will be intro'ed in
 New York and San Francisco for Christmas 1993, and nationwide, hopefully,
 in January.

      Atari's Jaguar is targeting the mass consumer market & will sell for
 $200, an optional compact disc player will cost an additional $200.  An
 IBM Corp. factory in Charlotte, N.C., will build the machine, but IBM is
 not at all involved in the marketing of the Jaguar.

      The Jaguar runs on 64-bit processors that are considerably faster and
 more powerful than the 16-bit systems sold by Sega Corp. and Nintendo Inc.
 The Jaguar is twice as powerful as a number of 32-bit systems due later
 this year.  "These two chips took about three years to develop. They are a
 major breakthrough in technology," Miller said.

      "We plan to market and advertise Jaguar very, very heavily.  We
 realize that's been our weakness in the past,"  Sam Tramiel said. Atari
 will spend $3 million on marketing in this year's fourth quarter and $45
 million in 1994.  Atari made it known they have about $40 million cash on
 hand to launch Jaguar.  Atari is also considering going to the public for
 additional financing in 1994.









-----------------------------------------
Return to message index