Addamax was an American
software
Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications.
The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...
company that developed
Trusted operating system
Trusted Operating System (TOS) generally refers to an operating system that provides sufficient support for multilevel security and evidence of correctness to meet a particular set of government requirements.
The most common set of criteria for tr ...
s based on
UNIX System V
Unix System V (pronounced: "System Five") is one of the first commercial versions of the Unix operating system. It was originally developed by AT&T and first released in 1983. Four major versions of System V were released, numbered 1, 2, 3, an ...
and
Berkeley Software Distribution
The Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), also known as Berkeley Unix or BSD Unix, is a discontinued Unix operating system developed and distributed by the Computer Systems Research Group (CSRG) at the University of California, Berkeley, beginn ...
(BSD) variants 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 ...
. The company was founded in 1986 in
Champaign, Illinois
Champaign ( ) is a city in Champaign County, Illinois, United States. The population was 88,302 at the 2020 census. It is the List of municipalities in Illinois, tenth-most populous municipality in Illinois and the fourth most populous city in ...
by Peter A. Alsberg and had a sales and development office in
Gaithersburg, Maryland
Gaithersburg ( ) is a city in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. At the time of the 2020 United States census, Gaithersburg had a population of 69,657, making it the third-largest incorporated city and the ninth-most populous communit ...
.
Addamax filed a high-profile
antitrust
Competition law is the field of law that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies. Competition law is implemented through public and private enforcement. It is also known as antitrust l ...
lawsuit in 1991 against the
Open Software Foundation
The Open Software Foundation, Inc. (OSF), was a not-for-profit industry consortium for creating an open standard for an implementation of the operating system Unix. It was formed in 1988 and merged with X/Open in 1996, to become The Open Group.
...
(OSF), alleging that OSF created a
cartel
A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collaborate with each other as well as agreeing not to compete with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. A cartel is an organization formed by producers ...
that controlled the UNIX operating system and exerted
monopsony
In economics, a monopsony is a market structure in which a single buyer substantially controls the market as the major purchaser of goods and services offered by many would-be sellers. The Microeconomics, microeconomic theory of monopsony assume ...
price fixing and led to the company going out of business.
References
External links
Federal Trade Commission paper on Standards which references Addamax
Software companies based in Illinois
1986 establishments in Illinois
Companies established in 1986
Defunct software companies of the United States
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