While the rest of tech fought over the "last mile" of broadband, Pixelworks said it cared about the last meter: the short trip from the cable into the screen. The Oregon startup designed chips that took video, computer graphics and web pages and made them look right on flat panel monitors and projectors. It went public in May 2000, three years after it was founded, with its ImageProcessor chip already inside high-end displays.

Founded in Tualatin

Pixelworks was incorporated in Oregon in January 1997, with Allen Alley as president, chief executive and chairman. The company bundled a whole display system onto one chip, with software that made it easy for manufacturers to use. It started with demanding products like high-resolution flat panels and multimedia projectors, where image quality sold the device. In December 1998 it launched its ImageProcessor chip.

Ten Dollars and Still Trading

Pixelworks priced its offering at $10 a share in May 2000 and listed on Nasdaq as PXLW. The stock rode the boom, then fell with the market. Over the next two decades the company kept adapting: projectors, then TVs, then image processors for smartphones, with much of its work centered in Shanghai. More than twenty-five years after its offering, Pixelworks still trades on Nasdaq and still files quarterly reports.

Cover: Les Andelys, Côte d'Aval, Paul Signac. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a painting made of dots (pixels).