Intergraph Corporation was an American software development and services company, which now forms part of Hexagon AB. It provides enterprise engineering and geospatially powered software to businesses, governments, and organizations around the world, and operates through three divisions: Hexagon Asset Lifecycle Intelligence (ALI, formerly PPM), Hexagon Safety & Infrastructure, and Hexagon Geospatial. The company's headquarters is in

Huntsville, Alabama Huntsville is the List of municipalities in Alabama, most populous city in the U.S. state of Alabama. The population of the city is estimated to be 241,114 in 2024, making it the List of United States cities by population, 100th-most populous ...

, United States. In 2008, Intergraph was one of the one hundred largest software companies in the world. In July 2010, Intergraph was acquired by Hexagon AB.

History

Intergraph was founded in 1969 as M&S Computing, Inc., by former

IBM International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...

engineers Jim Meadlock, his wife Nancy, Terry Schansman (the S of M&S), Keith Schonrock, and Robert Thurber who had been working with

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

and the U.S. Army in developing systems that would apply digital computing to real time missile guidance. The company was later renamed to ''Intergraph Corporation'' in 1980. One of Intergraph's major hardware projects was developing a line of workstations using the Clipper architecture created by

Fairchild Semiconductor Fairchild Semiconductor International, Inc. was an American semiconductor company based in San Jose, California. It was founded in 1957 as a division of Fairchild Camera and Instrument by the " traitorous eight" who defected from Shockley Semi ...

. Intergraph was one of only two companies to use the chips in a major product line. Intergraph developed their own version of

UNIX Unix (, ; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multi-user computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...

for the architecture, which they called CLIX. In 1987, Intergraph bought the Fairchild division responsible for the chip. In 1997, Intergraph began pursuing

patent infringement A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

litigation against

Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...

and other computer hardware manufacturers based on the intellectual property developed in Clipper. Intergraph negotiated major settlements with Intel, HP,

Texas Instruments Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) is an American multinational semiconductor company headquartered in Dallas, Texas. It is one of the top 10 semiconductor companies worldwide based on sales volume. The company's focus is on developing analog ...

and Gateway, earning the company over $394M. In 2000, Intergraph exited the hardware business and became purely a software company. On July 21, 2000, it sold its Intense3D graphics accelerator division to

3Dlabs 3DLABS Inc. Ltd. was a fabless semiconductor company. It was founded by Yavuz Ahıska and Osman Kent in 1994 with headquarters in San Jose, California. It originally developed the GLINT and PERMEDIA high-end graphics processing unit, graphics chi ...

, and its

workstation A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or computational science, scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by a single user, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating syste ...

and

server Server may refer to: Computing *Server (computing), a computer program or a device that provides requested information for other programs or devices, called clients. Role * Waiting staff, those who work at a restaurant or a bar attending custome ...

division to

Silicon Graphics Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and soft ...

. On November 29, 2006, Intergraph was acquired by an investor group led by

Hellman & Friedman Hellman & Friedman LLC (H&F) is an American private equity firm, founded in 1984 by Warren Hellman and Tully Friedman, that makes investments primarily through leveraged buyouts as well as growth capital investments. H&F has focused its efforts ...

LLC,

Texas Pacific Group TPG Inc., previously known as Texas Pacific Group and TPG Capital, is an American private equity firm based in Fort Worth, Texas. TPG manages investment funds in growth capital, venture capital, public equity, and debt investments. The firm in ...

and JMI Equity, making the company privately held. On October 28, 2010, Intergraph was acquired by Hexagon AB. The transaction marks the return of Intergraph as part of a publicly traded company. As part of the Hexagon acquisition, Hexagon moved the management of ERDAS, Inc. from under

Leica Geosystems Leica Geosystems (formerly known as Wild Heerbrugg or just Wild) based in eastern Switzerland produces products and systems for surveying and geographical measurement ( geomatics). Its products employ a variety of technologies including GPS ...

to Intergraph, and Z/I Imaging airborne imaging sensors from under Intergraph to Leica Geosystems. On December 2, 2013, the geospatial technology portfolio was split out from under the Intergraph Security, Government and Infrastructure division to form the Hexagon Geospatial division. On October 13, 2015, the Intergraph Security, Government & Infrastructure division was rebranded as Hexagon Safety & Infrastructure. On January 9, 2017, the Intergraph Government Solutions division was rebranded as Hexagon US Federal. On June 5, 2017, the Intergraph Process, Power & Marine division was rebranded as Hexagon PPM. On June 6, 2022, the Hexagon PPM division was rebranded as Hexagon Asset Lifecycle Intelligence.

References

External links

{{Hexagon AB 1969 establishments in Alabama 2010 disestablishments in Alabama 2010 mergers and acquisitions American companies established in 1969 American companies disestablished in 2010 Companies based in Huntsville, Alabama Computer companies established in 1969 Computer companies disestablished in 2010 Defunct computer companies of the United States Defunct computer hardware companies Defunct software companies of the United States GIS software companies Software companies based in Alabama Software companies established in 1969 Software companies disestablished in 2010