Hummingbird Ltd. (previously

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: HUMC, TSX: HUM) is a

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of OpenText and is a provider of enterprise software products including Exceed. Initially founded as a consulting business in 1984, Hummingbird moved into the connectivity market. Its enterprise content management ( ECM) software focuses on the management of the life cycle of enterprise content. Hummingbird has 40 offices worldwide. Customers include

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, and the

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History

Hummingbird was one of many vendors of X server and

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 ...

connectivity solutions for

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-based computers, with its eXceed product being regarded as "an excellent all-round product" in the form of eXceed/W at version 3.3.3 in one 1994 review. The product provided an X server alongside other traditional

TCP/IP The Internet protocol suite, commonly known as TCP/IP, is a framework for organizing the communication protocols used in the Internet and similar computer networks according to functional criteria. The foundational protocols in the suite are ...

-based applications such as

FTP The File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a standard communication protocol used for the transfer of computer files from a server to a client on a computer network. FTP is built on a client–server model architecture using separate control and dat ...

and telnet clients, supporting the wide range of TCP/IP stacks available for Windows at that time, requiring a minimum system specification of Windows 3.0 running on an Intel 80286-based PC with 2 MB of RAM. Version 4.0 of eXceed became available in 1994, and was released for

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in 1995. A survey of the PC X server market by International Data Corporation for 1993 portrayed Hummingbird as the market leader with a reported 32% market share. Acquisition of PCDOCS was one of the most important steps of the company in the way of formation as an ECM-oriented company. DOCS Open product of PCDOCS Inc. became Hummingbird DOCSFusion and DM - a part of Hummingbird document management system (a part of Hummingbird Enterprise Suite). The product still exists in OpenText products after rebranding with new name as eDOCS DM. In November 2012 OpenText launched the new v5.3.1 version with full support of

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and Windows Server 2012.

Mergers, acquisitions, IPOs

* 1984 - Hummingbird founded. * 1993 - Completes $45 million CAD IPO of common shares in

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, on the Toronto Stock Exchange. * 1994 - Completes US$34.5 million additional and secondary offering of common shares on

. * 1995 - Acquires Beame & Whiteside Software Inc., developer of NFS products. * 1996 - Purchased naming rights to the O'Keefe Centre, now known as Meridian Hall. * 1997 - Acquires TN3270 and TN5250 terminal emulation software from

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and PolarSoft Inc. in

. * 1998 ** Acquires

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solutions vendor, Andyne Computing Ltd. ** Acquires Datenrevision of Hamburg, Germany, a software consulting and distribution company. * 1999 ** Acquires Leonard's Logics SA, of

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, makers of Genio, a data transformation and exchange tool ( ETL) for deployment of data marts. ** Acquires PC DOCS Group International * 2000 - Ventured into

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, by tying up with Dess Computers as its systems integrator for Hummingbird products in India. * 2000 - Acquires imaging technology from Diamond Head Software Inc. * 2001 - Acquires UK company, PeopleDoc. * 2003 ** Acquires legal practice management firms LegalKEY Technologies and Kramer Lee & Associates. ** Acquires Valid Information Systems. ** Acquires Key Automation Nederland B.V. and its affiliate Dispro B.V., distributors and integrators of

document management A document management system (DMS) is usually a computerized system used to store, share, track and manage files or documents. Some systems include history tracking where a log of the various versions created and modified by different users is r ...

solutions in the

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and

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. * 2005 - Hummingbird acquires RedDot Solutions, rounding out its integrated ECM offering. * 2006 - Hummingbird acquired by Open Text for $489 million. Hummingbird informed Texas Guaranteed Student Loan Company that it had lost a piece of equipment—albeit password protected—containing the unencrypted personal data (names and social security numbers) of an estimated 1.3 million Texas

student loan A student loan is a type of loan designed to help students pay for post-secondary education and the associated fees, such as tuition, books and supplies, and living expenses. It may differ from other types of loans in the fact that the interest ...

recipients. The company's board of directors agreed to be sold to Symphony Technology Group, but following a hostile bid from Open Text, the board negotiated a deal with its rival and accepted an all-cash US$489 million buy-out from Open Text. Following the close of the deal in October, Open Text announced a 15% global workforce reduction. * 2008 - Gold Coast City Council rolls Hummingbird out as document management system to 3000+ employees

Products

* 1990 - Hummingbird Basic and Hummingbird QuickScript * 1994 - Host Explorer

References

External links

* *
OpenText Exceed
successor to Hummingbird flagship X server product

{{OpenText OpenText Defunct software companies of Canada Software companies established in 1984 Canadian companies established in 1984 Software companies disestablished in 2006 1984 establishments in Ontario 2006 disestablishments in Ontario 2006 mergers and acquisitions Defunct companies of Ontario Companies based in Toronto