Microway was incorporated in July, 1982 to develop, produce, and market software for the Intel 8087 coprocessor in the IBM PC. Widely credited with introducing numeric coprocessors to the general market, Microway became the primary source and recognized industry leader for numeric coprocessors and supporting software. Today Microway's reputation is based on excellence in designing and manufacturing high density Linux and UNIX workstations and clusters. Trademarks include Microway, Navion, NodeWatch, Number Smasher, Screamer, SuperCache, NDP, flickerFIXER, and Quadputer. Despite a wide-reaching influence over a vast and dynamic marketplace, Microway remains a small woman-owned business, and a Massachusetts corporation. Microway's GSA contract number is GS-35F-0431N.

1983-1984: Microway introduces compiler libraries, mathematical software packages and RTOS, a port of Intel's iRMX real time operating system for the PC.

1985: The industry takes notice as Microway launches its NumberSmasher, which accelerates the speed of the PC to an unprecedented 12 MHz and also provides one megabyte of memory for DOS applications. The same year, a subsidiary is established in Europe.

1986: Microway designes 287Turbo, which doubles floating point performance in the IBM PC AT.

1987: Microway announces a line of transputer-based parallel processing boards, high speed numeric coprocessor cards based on the Weitek 1167, and flickerFIXER, an enhanced video graphics board for the Amiga 2000 and 2500.

1988: Another mark is made as Microway becomes the first company to release 80386-based, protected mode compilers for DOS, UNIX, and XENIX. These include FORTRAN, Pascal, and C compilers with full support for the 80387 and Weitek 3167.

1989: The company introduces compilers for the 80486 and begins a development program for the Intel i860 RISCprocessor.


1990: Microway ships its new Number Smasher-860 and compilers. Also released is FASTCache-SX accelerator which allows users to run Windows 3.0 in 386 Enhanced Mode on their old ATs.

1991: Microway introduces NDP compilers for Windows, and a line of 80486-based custom workstations.

1992: Higher speed processors are added to Microway's workstation product line, compilers for OS/2, and customized versions of its compilers for the Japanese NEC and Okidata computers.

1993-1994: The company adds a four processor "QuadPuter-860" board plus a new line of Intel® Pentium® based File Servers. Software additions include NDP Fortran-90, LAPACK, a linear algebra package and NDP FFT, a DSP package.

1995: Microway designs workstations and compilers based on the Digital Alpha RISC processor.

1996-1997: Industry demand prompts Microway to expand its offerings of Alpha-based motherboards and custom workstations. Markets for these include UNIX, Linux and NT File Servers, RAID Servers, 3D design, video animation, internet applications and high performance numerics applications.

1998: Microway releases its 64 bit NDP Fortran compiler for Linux and 667 MHz, 8 MB Cache Alpha "Screamer" motherboards, integrated in rack-mount systems and custom workstations.

1999: New technology offerings include hardware and software products based on the state of the art 21264 EV6 Alpha processor, plus Beowulf configurations with PVM and MPI.

2000: The company manufactures its proprietary rack-mount chassis which houses four processors on two motherboards, for Beowulf clustering applications. This chassis provides the highest density configurations possible. The company also introduces a 4U custom-designed rack-mount chassis for the 264DP dual Alpha. This chassis features an N+1 redundant power supply.

2001: New technology including a dual Alpha in 1U configuration for compact clustering and Scyld Beowulf cluster management software are introduced. Microway starts delivering HPTC solutions to the biotechnology and genome processing markets.

2002: Microway delivers NodeWatch™, its remote cluster environmental monitoring and control hardware/software combination. Microway announces CW Beowulf Cluster Series, powered by Platform™ Computing software. Intel chooses Microway as one of five Premier Partners to offer the Itanium®2 introduction. Microway's Chairperson is chosen as a member of Intel's Premier Partner Advisory Board. Additionally, Microway designs and manufactures custom 1U Rack chassis with "PUSH/PULL" forced air cooling for dual AMD® Athlon™ and dual Intel® Xeon™ configurations. The Xeon 1U offers 3 PCI slots and a 460W power supply, unique to the industry.

2003: Microway adds Navion™ and NumberSmasher®-64 product lines. The Navion product line includes servers and clusters based on the AMD® Opteron™ processor. The NumberSmasher®-64 includes dual and quad processor servers and clusters based on Intel's Itanium® 2 procssor. Microway Navion Clusters were awarded "Best 64-Bit Turnkey Solution" at Clusterworld. Microway is granted GSA contract number is GS-35F-0431N.

2004: Microway released it's quad and 8 way Opteron SMP platforms in a 4U configuration with redundant power supplies and multiple removable hard drive bays. Microway also announced the availability of the commercial version of MPI Link-Checker, the diagnostic tool for debugging interconnects in large clusters. Microway was awarded significant cluster contracts with Harvard University (used for modeling the origins of the universe) and the University of New Hampshire (used for earth science and space research). Both clusters employed 64 bit Opteron NavionT compute nodes and fast interconnects.

2005: Microway debuts its dual core Opteron based clusters and advanced WhisperStation™ ultra quiet workstation. Also the company announced its affiliation with PathScale, as a lead partner to market its InfiniPath™ interconnect. In mid 2005, Microway released it FasTree product line of modular, stackable InfiniBand switches. The company has been awarded large cluster contracts by Boeing, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Emory University, NIST, Naval Research Laboratory, and University of Louisville.

2006: Microway announced MMDS, Microway MPI Diagnostic Suite--a combination of MPI Link-Checker and FasTree. To further enhance the reliability of clusters in the field, Microway implements and installs MPI Link Checker and FasTree on clusters. This software product checks all links on the cluster and provides a thorough understanding of the interconnect speed and highlights issues with MPI transfers.

2007: Microway delivered Intel Quad-Core Xeon-based clusters and storage servers. The company further developed its Opteron-based ServaStor storage servers with Lustre Parallel File Server software and InfiniBand hardware. Also the company announced its affiliation with RPU manufacturer DRC. Microway exhibited at trade shows including HPCC Newport, HPC on Wall Street, Linux/Open Source on Wall Street, SIFMA Technology Conference in New York and Supercomputing07 in Reno. Large clusters and storage servers were delivered to Alabama Supercomputer, CSC, Georgia Institute of Technology, LLNL, NASA Glenn, University of Massachusetts and University of Georgia.

2008: Microway designed TriComX, an InfiniBand HCA based on new Mellanox ConnectX technology - bringing dramatic improvements to HPC interconnect latency. In conjunction with this, new versions of MPI Link-Checker were introduced improving compatibility with larger HPC workflows. The company also began implementation of AMD quad-core Opteron processors in several large clusters. Microway became an Nvidia PartnerForce Premier dealer, delivering clusters and workstations integrating very high end graphic cards and leading edge Tesla GPUs with CUDA development software. Also introduced was a dual server solution in a 1U package with InfiniBand for applications requiring dense 4P, quad-core Intel or Opteron platforms.

Significant quad-core clusters were delivered to Atmospheric Prediction, Factory Mutual Insurance Company, MIT, New York State Department of Health, and University of Arizona. Trade shows attended included HPCC Newport, Linux/Open Source on Wall Street and NEPCON/OEM East in Boston.

2009 to date: Microway introduced Intel Xeon 5500 ("Nehalem") series workstations and HPC clusters to its quad core product line. In keeping with its green initiative, Microway's newest Intel platform solutions maximize both energy efficiency and performance density with over twice the performance of previous systems and 30+% power savings. Combined with 93% efficient power supplies, Microway clusters, servers and WhisperStations consume 30% less power and generate less heat. Microway began shipping 36 port QDR InfiniBand switches and ConnectX TriCom HCAs, improving HPC interconnect latency. Many customers purchased Personal Supercomputers with one to four NVIDIA Tesla C1060 GPUs and added S1070 Quad-GPU servers to their computational cluster designs.

Significant quad-core clusters were delivered to universities including: Columbia, Georgia Tech, Harvard, New Hampshire, Mississippi, Northwestern; several US Government Research Laboratories; and corporations including Schlumberger Doll and Tech-X.

Microway is recognized worldwide for products which push performance of current technology to the limit. The integrity of our products and service has been proven time and time again. A glimpse at our customer base illustrates Microway's scope of influence across the technical computing industry. Customers for the company's products include major US Government research laboratories (like CDC, NASA and NIST), Lockheed, Lucent, Mayo Clinic, Pfizer, Rolls Royce, Seagate, and ISPs and universities in the US and worldwide.