The move is the latest in a long succession of spinoffs by the development tools supplier, which has to date ended up rolling former subsidiaries back into to its core business. Last week, Corel announced plans to take over Inprise/Borland.

Dale Fuller, Inprise/Borland's interim chief executive, said: "By combining the Interbase technology with an experienced management team in a startup environment, we are enabling users to leverage the power of this world class database for multiple platforms."

The firm will take some of the cash for the new venture from a $60 million fund that it announced in January to invest in startups that are developing applications based on Linux, Internet and wireless technology.

The new Interbase company will be headed by Ann Harrison, one of the founders of the original Interbase that was taken over by Borland. Paul Beach, who is based in the UK and will remain so, will become vice president of sales.

Back in January, Inprise/Borland announced that the upcoming release, version 6.0, would support two more operating environments, Linux and Sun Microsystems' Solaris, on top of its traditional Microsoft Windows and Novell Netware platforms. The company also said it would release Interbase source code to the open source community.

But another joint founder, Don DePalma, has expressed concern at the open source plan. Because of the complexity of Interbase, he claimed: "You really don't want non-experts mucking about with it."