The return of Safi Qureshey

Attention old timers: Remember Safi Qureshey? He was the "S" in AST, the once-mighty PC manufacturer that was also one of the first big casualties of the industry consolidation.

After years of laying relatively low, he's back as CEO and founder of a new company: Quartics, which specializes in video and media processors. These chips help speed up how PCs and other devices handle graphic-heavy images.

A lot of companies have tried this in the past, and they have failed. But they all also debuted before video was big on the Web, and way before people started clicking into the Web from handhelds. Enterprise Capital and Foundation Partners have invested in the company. It was founded in 2003, and the first Quartics chips are coming off the line this year, according to the company's Web site. (Chips--they take time.)

Qureshey will describe more fully what the company is about at the Digital Home Developers Conference in San Jose, Calif., on Oct. 12.