Pro Audio Spectrum Plus: ISA audio card, 8-bit digital sampling, 16-bit digital audio playback with CD-ROM interface, Sound Blaster compatibility.Pro Audio Spectrum (1991): 8-bit ISA audio card with CD-ROM interface.Media Vision's products included PC adapter cards, other hardware, and computer games. Īfter seeking protection under Chapter 11 of the federal Bankruptcy Code in December 1994, Media Vision Technology Inc. The investigation and trial lasted nearly a decade, resulting in criminal charges filed against Jain in 1998, his unsuccessful indictment on 27 counts of financial fraud, and judgments against Jain and CFO Steve Allen. On May 17, 1994, CEO Paul Jain stepped down as Media Vision and quickly became the subject of the longest-running securities fraud case in Silicon Valley history.
During the same year, the company expanded business operations into Europe with the establishment of Media Vision GmbH in Munich, Germany. The new logo reflected the company's desire to be known as a cutting-edge multimedia technology company. CD-ROM titles such as Critical Path, Quantum Gate, and Forever Growing Garden were often bundled with its multimedia kits.
Perhaps one of the biggest endeavors was the company's leap into software publishing with the creation of its Multimedia Publishing Group. In 1993, Media Vision updated its logotype to reflect its expanding product lines and broad foray into technologies beyond computer audio. Media Vision developed three complex chips such as a 16-bit accelerator chip, an FM synthesis chip and a Mixed Signal DSP. Jain oversaw the development of several multimedia chips because he quickly realized that the audio board business would morph into audio chips on PC motherboards. After the demise of Media Vision, several of Pellucids employees founded 3dfx. Pellucid had taken over SGI's IrisVision business and developed high-performance video graphics cards, sold as the Pro Graphics 1024. In 1993, Media Vision took over Pellucid, a spin-off of Silicon Graphics to form the new Visual Technology Group. Media Vision became a publicly traded company in late 1992. Jain raised funding, based on a business plan on a single sheet of paper, from top VCs such as Brentwood, Nazem, 3i and others. As Bratton recalls, he wrote the company's business plan while an engineer at National Semiconductor based on Jain's vision of evolving multimedia from VGA to audio and video. Early employees also included Russ Faust, Michael Humphries, Dan Gochnauer, Bryan Colvin and Doug Cody, all from Jain's prior company, Video-7. Media Vision was founded in May 1990 by Paul Jain and Tim Bratton.