Definition: Borland

(Borland Software Corporation, Austin, TX) A software company founded as Borland International in 1983 by Philippe Kahn. The company was noted for its language and development products. It also popularized the DOS desktop accessory (see Sidekick). Borland's Turbo Pascal moved the Pascal language out of the academic halls into a commercial product, and its Turbo C became an industry standard. Borland C++ and Delphi were widely used for developing Windows applications, and its JBuilder Java environment was very popular.

In 1987, Borland acquired the Paradox database from Ansa Software as well as dBASE and Interbase from Ashton-Tate in 1991, making it the leader in PC databases at that time. It later sold Paradox to Corel and spun off Delphi, JBuilder and Interbase into the CodeGear division.

In 1998, Borland changed its name to Inprise Corporation in recognition of its focus on "integrating the enterprise" but changed it back to Borland three years later. In 2009, the company was acquired by Micro Focus International and then OpenText in 2023. See Turbo C, Borland C++, dBASE Plus, Interbase, JBuilder, Paradox and Delphi.

Philippe Kahn

Borland's founder was a notable personality in the early days of personal computing and led the company into some very successful ventures. (Image courtesy of Borland Software Corporation.)