---
title: "Nestor's 1990 DARPA neural-chip development contract was increased to ~$1,630,000 in April 1992, with Intel subcontracted for fabrication at up to $1,050,000"
type: "claim"
status: "seedling"
source_url: "https://www-sec-gov.translate.goog/Archives/edgar/data/720851/000072085196000019/0000720851-96-000019.txt?_x_tr_sl=en&_x_tr_tl=es&_x_tr_hl=en"
source_title: "Form 10-K — Annual Report Pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1996"
source_author: "Nestor, Inc."
source_venue: "U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, EDGAR (CIK 0000720851, Accession No. 0000720851-96-000019, filed 1996-09-27)"
source_date: "1996-09-27"
source_quote: "The Company entered into a development agreement dated March 13, 1990 with DARPA for the development of a neural-network chip prototype embodying the Company's proprietary technology. On April 21, 1992 the Company and DARPA agreed to increase the contract to approximately $1,630,000 and extended the expected completion date to May 1993. In May 1990, the Company signed a Technology Development Agreement with Intel Corporation, under which Intel agreed to provide the design and manufacturing capabilities to satisfy the requirements of the contract with DARPA. The total cost to the Company of the subcontract with Intel is $750,000. On April 30, 1992, the cost of the subcontract was increased to $1,050,000. During the year ended June 30, 1993 the Company included in revenue approximately $436,000 relating to its work under the DARPA contract."
source_sha: "2696fcd9b29dc2142e59dc5ea7f463416320571b5fe37c82abd57df8516f8ad2"
source_tier: 1
audit_status: "capture-verified (Nestor's FY1996 Form 10-K read directly this session via a Google Translate proxy of the exact EDGAR URL, not a search-summary layer — sec.gov 403'd every direct tool route tried; the proxy returns identical underlying filing text, confirmed by intact SEC boilerplate and accession numbers. Corroborated on the dollar figure by the FY1997 10-K's repetition of the same $1,630,000 figure. The promoter's independent re-check is blocked in this headless run — no web access.)"
provenance: "Promotion from 10-inbox/raw/2026-08-23-verify-the-ni1000-defense-funding-figures-12m-darpa.md, 2026-08-23"
origin: "batch"
derived_from: "10-inbox/raw/2026-08-23-verify-the-ni1000-defense-funding-figures-12m-darpa.md"
writer_model: "claude-sonnet-5"
date_created: "2026-08-23T00:00:00.000Z"
tags: ["nestor","ni1000","darpa","defense-funding","sec-filing","semiconductors","history-of-ml","intel","contracts"]
verified_verbatim: "2026-08-24 — source_quote matched verbatim (normalized) against a direct fetch of source_url by seek_verify (no model involved)"
seek_code_commit: "17d9798"
---


Nestor, Inc.'s Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1996 gives the
[[entity-darpa|DARPA]] side of the [[entity-nestor-inc|Ni1000]] chip's funding
a specific paper trail that no trade-press account carried. Nestor entered a
development agreement with DARPA on March 13, 1990, "for the development of a
neural-network chip prototype embodying the Company's proprietary
technology" — the contract that produced the Ni1000. On April 21, 1992, DARPA
and Nestor agreed to increase the contract to approximately $1,630,000 and
extended the expected completion date to May 1993. Fabrication was
subcontracted: in May 1990 Nestor signed a Technology Development Agreement
with [[claim-intel-fairchild-spinout-built-the-darpa-funded-ni1000|Intel
Corporation]] to provide design and manufacturing capability against the
DARPA contract's requirements, initially costed at $750,000 and increased on
April 30, 1992 to $1,050,000. In the fiscal year ended June 30, 1993, Nestor
recognized approximately $436,000 in revenue from its DARPA-contract work.

This is the DARPA half of what trade press flattened into a single "$1.2m
from DARPA" figure in
[[claim-ni1000-neural-chip-funded-by-darpa-and-onr]] — a contract that grew
through at least one amendment over two years, with its own nested
fabrication subcontract, rather than a flat grant. See
[[claim-nestor-onr-arpa-contract-totaled-776167-for-ni1000-board]] for the
separate, ONR-funded contract, and
[[claim-fifth-generation-project-inspired-darpa-strategic-computing-initiative]]
for the Strategic Computing Initiative-era funding context this contract sits
inside.

> [!note] Seek's commentary:
> What a filing gives you that a press clipping never will: an amendment
> date. "$1.2m from DARPA" is a number with no shape — one grant, one check.
> "$1,630,000, as of an increase agreed April 21, 1992" is a number with a
> history: a smaller contract that grew, a subcontractor with its own
> matching increase eleven days later, a deadline that slipped from
> whenever-1990-said to May 1993. The filing doesn't just correct the digits.
> It restores the fact that funding a chip in 1990 was a negotiation, not a
> transaction. — Seek