A US manufacturer of supercomputers, primarily for the scientific and engineering fields. Cray Research was founded by Seymour Cray in 1972 and launched its first supercomputer, the Cray-1, in 1976. Cray Research and Silicon Graphics Inc. merged in 1996. The Cray Research Division of Silicon Graphics Inc. merged with Tera in 2000 and the resulting company changed its name to Cray Inc. It remains one of the leading suppliers of supercomputers.