About SpectraScan International, Inc.

H I S T O R Y
	HOW SPECTRASCAN INTERNATIONAL CAME TO BE

SpectraScan International Inc., (previously SpectraScan, Inc.), was founded by its current president, Jan C. Hoigaard, in 1980.

The company's original product line consisted of Factory Automation Products, such as "EMBEDDED CONTROLLERS", but by 1983, the company had developed a small family of multi-function static control workstation monitors.

These monitors could continuously monitor either single or dual conductor wrist-straps, the resistance into ground of the workstation mat and the resistance into earth, (into the soil surrounding the ground-stakes), of both the electrical ground and the separate earth ground.

This monitoring capability was revolutionary in 1983, and to this day, such complete monitoring capability is offered only by SpectraScan.

The company's automation product line was developed in parallel with the comapny's Static Control Products, and included the DataScan Mark II modular "Data Acquisition & Control" unit.

The DataScan Mark II unit is basically a rack-mount industrial IBM compatible PC computer, that can accept up to 10 input/output plug-in cards through 10 slots on its rear panel. Plug-in cards for digital I/O, digital-to-analog conversion and analog-to-digital conversion of differing capacities, make up the cards available for the DataScan Unit.

Although it was originally assumed that there would be no functional relationships between the company's two product lines, the advent of ISO-9000, and its requirement for detailed data collection, changed that concept and the existence of the DataScan Unit made it relatively easy to create the ASC-300 Automated Static Control System.

The ASC-300 system consists of a DataScan Unit, a number of daisy-chained PSI-216 interface units, and a number of SpectraScan's multi-function workstation units that are modified to include digital output jacks for transmission of the moment-to-moment status of the workstations.

This continuous data, is displayed on a computer monitor, stored in memory and processed into a variety of history and statistical reports that may be displayed on the monitor, or printed. The user may select reports for periods ranging from one day to typically more than 10 years.

A single DataScan unit can monitor more than 7000 workstations for the 4 functions of wrist-strap, bench-top, earth ground and electrical ground. This monitoring is truly continuous. No data or event is ever missed or lost, due to local memory for each workstation monitor. The refresh rate for the central data bank is typically less than 0.5 seconds!

Again, SpectraScan was first to offer such an advanced automated static control system. Recently, a couple of similar systems have surfaced, but the ASC-300 system remains the undisputed leader in terms of advanced technology, capacity and cost effectiveness.

SpectraScan Inc., the original corporation, was sold to a "holding company" in 1993. Mr. Hoigaard retained the position of president, but no longer owned any significant part of SpectraScan, Inc.

By 1995, it became obvious, the holding company could not properly operate and support SpectraScan, Inc., and by November 1, 1995, Mr. Hoigaard had negotiated with the holding company, to buy the assets of SpectraScan, Inc. (but not the corporation), and on November 17, 1995, he incorporated a new company under the similar name of SpectraScan International, Inc. All the products and all the customer accounts were part of the asset purchase, and for most customers, the transition was barely noticed.

Under Mr. Hoigaard's leadership, the new SpectraScan International, Inc. quickly reorganized and today enjoys a solid reputation as the technology leader.

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