History / Milestones

Creative licenses Intel's Indeo™ video technology and will incorporate the i750® video processor family into future digital video product lines. Intel's Indeo video allows for software-only playback and delivers "free" video playback to the desktop PC without the need for add-on hardware. Indeo video is supported in Microsoft's Video for Windows, IBM's OS/2 R2.1 and Ultimedia Video In, and Apple Computer's QuickTime for Windows.

Creative licenses Digital Equipment Corporation's DECtalk text-to-speech technology for its software, Creative TextAssist, which works with Sound Blaster 16 audio boards with Advanced Signal Processing to enable true speech sounds without the need to store larger wave files.

Creative broadens her Sound Blaster 16-bit offerings with the introduction of Sound Blaster 16 Basic; Sound Blaster 16 MultiCD with three built-in CD-ROM interfaces; and Sound Blaster 16 SCSI-2 with the industry standard SCSI-2 interface.
Creative is awarded two of the 14 EMMA Awards handed out at 1993 Intermedia Europe Conference and Exhibition held in Germany. The awards recognizes Creative's product excellence and her landmark contribution to the multimedia industry.
Creative acquires Westpoint Creative, a leading UK multimedia distributor, in its further commitment towards the European market. The new company, Creative Labs (UK) Ltd., aims to provide better services and support for OEMs, resellers and end-users in the European region.

Creative Labs, Inc., Creative's US headquarters, announces the opening of its Technical Support Center in Stillwater, Oklahoma which will offer expanded operational hours and more technical agents to provide registered users with prompt solutions to their technical problems.

Creative and Computamart Pty Ltd announce a joint venture to form a new entity known as Creative Pacific Pty Ltd in Australia. Computamart Pty Ltd, trading since 1983, has developed a fine reputation for introducing exciting and desirable products to the PC market at affordable prices. Creative Pacific will distribute Creative's multimedia products and will engage in OEM operations.
Creative Technology and IO Data Device, Inc. establish a joint venture company, Creative Media K.K., located in Tokyo, Japan. IO Data Device, Inc., a Tokyo OTC-listed company, is a top-brand manufacturer of PC peripherals in Japan. Creative Media K.K. will exclusively import and market Creative's product lines in Japan and will also handle localization of the Sound Blaster technology for the Japanese PC platform including NEC-PC 98 systems.

Creative completes its secondary offering of 3.5 million Ordinary Shares at US$28.50 per share on the US NASDAQ market.
Creative announces that Creative VoiceAssist™ will begin shipping in mid-July as its first stand-alone speech recognition software product.
Creative acquires ShareVision® Technology Inc. for US$11 million. ShareVision develops video conferencing products that allow users to communicate using video, voice and graphics anywhere in the world over a single regular analog telephone line while simultaneously collaborating on Windows applications.

Creative begins shipping Sound Blaster 16 which includes Creative's speech recognition application, Creative VoiceAssist™ that allows customization of any Windows application with voice commands, and supports simultaneous access to up to a 1,024-word vocabulary for each of up to 30 different applications, providing an effective total vocabulary of 30,000 words.

Creative acquires E-mu Systems®, Inc, a leading developer and manufacturer of innovative audio products based on digital sampling technology for musical instruments and multimedia markets.

Other milestones in 1995 | 1994 | 1993 | 1992 & earlier