Chapter 10 - Networking: Market Competition 1981-1983
10.3 Proteon
In early 1979, MIT’s Laboratory for Computer Science gave Proteon a $100,000 contract to develop Version 2 of their token ring Local Network Interface (LNI), ostensibly because they would get a product faster than doing it themselves. But it took Proteon until June 1981 to deliver working boards. In the same month, Proteon made its first commercial shipment, to UCLA, and in August, its first international sale, to the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment. The availability of token-ring controllers barely caused a ripple in the gathering tide of Ethernet.