Convex Unveils Revamped Product Line

Convex Computer Corp. on Tuesday started a supercomputer slugfest, unveiling three computer families, with one that directly challenges industry leader Cray Research Inc.

The 20 products in the company’s C-3, for third generation, series make supercomputers more accessible by lowering their cost, Convex officials said.

“We want to add value to the customers,” said Convex President and Chief Executive Robert J. Paluck.

For now, the company will stay away from the top of the high-end computing niche Cray dominates because the number of customers is too small, he said.

“There are just very few people that really need the very fastest machine,” Paluck said.

Convex, which had $209 million in revenue last year, in nine years has become the dominant player in the mini-supercomputer niche, producing machines that crunched 200 million calculations a second and cost up to $2.5 million.

Analysts and customers for months had expected Convex to move into Cray’s league with its new generation.

But the company also introduced models that perform at the same level of its second generation for half the cost and some that quadruple the performance of the second generation for the same cost.

“What they’re doing is essentially refreshing their whole product line,” said Daniel C. Benton, analyst for Goldman Sachs & Co.

The announcement didn’t help Convex’s stock price, which fell 75 cents a share to $17.625 in New York Stock Exchange trading.

Convex’s C-3800 family, which will sell from $2.5 million to $8 million, challenges Cray with machines that have up to eight processors, 4 billion bytes of memory and the ability to make 4 billion calculations a second.

Twelve of Cray’s 22 computers fall in the Convex price range, including six that were introduced last month.

One of the chief differences between the two companies is the type of system used to cool their machines. Convex has always used air cooling while Cray, because of its bigger computers, has used more sophisticated water cooling. Cray’s new lower-priced models can be cooled either way.

The demand for supercomputers is increasing in large part because new powerful workstations are starting to give thousands of researchers the ability to gain access to supercomputers from their own labs.

Convex introduced the C-3400 and C-3200 families to continue serving its price-dependent customer base as it expands into markets where performance is key, Paluck said.

The C-3400 computers, priced from $650,000 to $2 million, can have up to eight processors, 2 billion bytes of memory and make 800 million calculations a second.

The C-3200 computers essentially perform the same as the Convex’s second generation, introduced in 1988, but for half the cost, about $350,000. The machines feature up to four processors, 2 billion bytes of memory and make 200 million calculations a second.

Convex is able to deliver the C-3200 computers now, and should begin delivery of the C-3400 and C-3800 computers during the third quarter, the company said.