Vermeer Technologies Incorporated was a software company founded in 1994 by Charles H. Ferguson and

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. Its products were a

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development tool,

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, and a Web server,

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, which complemented developing in FrontPage. Vermeer launched the initial version of FrontPage on October 2, 1995. Vermeer was funded by

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, Sigma Partners, and

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. The company was purchased by

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...

for

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133 million in January 1996 ($ in present-day terms). Microsoft acquired FrontPage as a new weapon in the

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. The company's birth, development, and sale were the subject of Ferguson's 1999 book, ''High St@kes, No Prisoners.'' A Harvard Business School case, "Vermeer Technologies (A): A Company is Born" (HBS 9-397-078), described the start of the company. Even after Microsoft acquired FrontPage, the software continued to store proprietary configuration settings in directories whose names started with _vti. The letters "VTI" stand for Vermeer Technologies, Inc.

References

Microsoft Press release announcing Vermeer acquisition

History of Frontpage by SEO Consultants

Defunct software companies of the United States Microsoft acquisitions American companies established in 1994 Companies disestablished in 1996 {{Ict-company-stub