Troubled Tadpole cuts 20 per cent off notebook prices

The cuts apply to the Cambridge-based firm's SPARCbook 3GX-based systems and reflect falling memory prices, Tadpole said. The units are aimed at Unix CAD/CAM and other specialist applications. A 3GX with 1.2Gb SCSI hard drive and 32Mb now costs from £10,300. Memory upgrade kits also fall in price by half.

Tadpole earlier this month replaced CEO and co-founder George Grey with former SCO executive Bernard Hulme after Grey resigned. The firm has suffered a series of losses despite one-time heavy investment from IBM and upbeat projections by the stock market analysts.

European marketing manager Catherine Morris said Tadpole had been hurt recently by Intel delivering a higher voltage version of the 166MHz Pentium than had been expected but added that sales were solid in the SPARC line. 70 per cent of sales are now to the US, she added.