Be Incorporated hoped to shake up the hardware and software industries, but its efforts fell flat
In 1990, former Apple executive Jean-Louis Gassée co-founded a new venture with the aim of shaking up Silicon Valley.
Be Incorporated, or as it came to be known, ‘Be’, left a lasting impact on the global technology sector, despite eventually slipping into relative obscurity. The goal? To create a new operating system using C++ complete with complementary hardware.
Joining forces with Steve Sakoman, a fellow Apple executive, the duo reportedly began developing a prototype desktop computer just one day after Gassée left the tech giant.
Be’s two-pronged approach to achieving Silicon Valley dominance centered around the BeOS operating system and the BeBox computer.
The former was released in 1995, and was surprisingly ahead of its time, being built primarily as a “media OS”, aimed at being able to contend with the expected onslaught of digital media in years to come.
This included support for analog and digital audio, with later versions offering users full 32-bit color graphics, virtual desktops (known as ‘workspaces’) and later on with browser support.
