History
Keith A. Bentley, in conjunction with his brother, Barry J. Bentley, founded Bentley Systems in 1984. They introduced the commercial version of PseudoStation in 1985, which allowed users of Intergraph's VAX systems to use low-cost graphics terminals to view and modify the designs on their Intergraph IGDS (Interactive Graphics Design System) installations. This greatly expanded access to such designs, which could otherwise be accessed only through very expensive special purpose workstations. The product was shown to potential users who were polled as to what they would be willing to pay it. The Bentley brothers then decided to simply average the results, thus arriving at a price of $7,943.
The Bentley's PseudoStation experience convinced them that there was a ready market for a stand-alone personal computer-based CAD system compatible with the Intergraph CAD file format. At the time, the IBM AT personal computer, based on Intel's 80286 microprocessor, was just becoming available, and their tests showed that it had enough processing power, disk speed, and graphics capability to do the job. MicroStation Version 1, which allowed users to download files directly from their VAX system to their PC to view and plot them (a very primitive Bentley View), was introduced to the market in 1986.
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