Private company

Green Hills Software

Logo: Green Hills Software, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons3

American software company

Green Hills Software is a privately owned company that builds operating systems and programming tools for embedded systems. The firm was founded in 1982 by Dan O'Dowd and Carl Rosenberg. Its headquarters are in Santa Barbara, California.2 Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0

Last updated Oct 21, 2026.

Overview

1982Founded1
  • Industryembedded system1
  • HeadquartersSanta Barbara1
  • Websitewww.ghs.com
  • Legal formprivately held company1

Green Hills Software is a privately owned company that builds operating systems and programming tools for embedded systems. The firm was founded in 1982 by Dan O'Dowd and Carl Rosenberg. Its headquarters are in Santa Barbara, California.2

The story

Founded by Dan O'Dowd in 1982.1

In the 1990s, Green Hills Software and Wind River Systems, both makers of embedded system software development tools, entered into a 99-year agreement to cooperatively support customers using products from both companies. The agreement was terminated after a lawsuit in 2005. After parting ways, Wind River publicly embraced Linux and open-source software while Green Hills initiated a public relations campaign decrying the use of open-source software in projects related to national security.

In 2008, the Green Hills real-time operating system (RTOS) named Integrity-178 was the first system to be certified by the National Information Assurance Partnership (NIAP), composed of National Security Agency (NSA) and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), to Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 6+.

In November 2008, it was announced that a commercialized version of Integrity 178-B would be offered to the private sector by Integrity Global Security, a subsidiary of Green Hills Software.

On March 27, 2012, a contract was announced between Green Hills Software and Nintendo. This designates MULTI as the official integrated development environment and toolchain for Nintendo and its licensed developers to program the Wii U video game console.

On February 25, 2014, it was announced that the operating system Integrity had been chosen by Urban Aeronautics for their AirMule flying car unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), since renamed the Tactical Robotics Cormorant.

From Wikipedia’s article on Green Hills Software, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Leadership

Who has led Green Hills Software, and when. Pick a name to see everywhere that person has worked.

Products and brands

  • operating system

Listed on Wikidata.1

Real-time operating systems

Integrity is a POSIX real-time operating system (RTOS). An Integrity variant, named Integrity-178B, was certified to Common Criteria Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 6+, High Robustness in November 2008.

Micro Velosity (stylized as μ-velOSity) is a real-time microkernel for resource-constrained devices.

Compilers

Green Hills produces compilers for the programming languages C, C++, Fortran, and Ada. They are cross-platform, for 32- and 64-bit microprocessors, including RISC-V, ARM, Blackfin, ColdFire, MIPS, PowerPC, SuperH, StarCore, x86, V850, and XScale.

Integrated development environments

MULTI is an integrated development environment (IDE) for the programming languages C, C++, Embedded C++ (EC++), and Ada, aimed at embedded engineers.

Read the full text

TimeMachine is a set of tools for optimizing and debugging C and C++ software. TimeMachine (introduced 2003) supports reverse debugging, a feature that later also became available in the free GNU Debugger (GDB) 7.0 (2009).

From Wikipedia’s article on Green Hills Software, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Timeline

  1. 1982Founded Founded1

Funding

Where the company's money came from, by calendar year: private offerings filed with the SEC, federal grants, loans, contracts and other assistance from USAspending.gov, and PPP loans from the SBA. Each bar links to the records below.

Money received by year$27.6M 2008–2026
Figures by year
YearFederal contractsTotal
2026$478.0K$478.0K
2025$5.2M$5.2M
2024$1.8M$1.8M
2023$1.2M$1.2M
2022$2.2M$2.2M
2021$937.8K$937.8K
2020$698.2K$698.2K
2019$398.1K$398.1K
2018$796.4K$796.4K
2017$1.1M$1.1M
2016$931.5K$931.5K
2015$1.6M$1.6M
2014$2.1M$2.1M
2013$1.8M$1.8M
2012$1.3M$1.3M
2011$1.2M$1.2M
2010$955.0K$955.0K
2009$828.5K$828.5K
2008$2.1M$2.1M

Federal awards

Obligated amounts from USAspending.gov5, by calendar year, 2008–2026, for 3 registered units, including subsidiaries under the same parent. Obligations are what agencies committed, not always what was paid out. Contracts pay for goods and services; grants, loans and direct payments are assistance. Loans are charted at the face value of the loans listed here. An award’s amount below is its lifetime total, and some began before the years charted.

Largest contracts

  1. Sep 19, 2025$4.1M from Department of the Navy: Green hills sw support6 To GREEN HILLS SOFTWARE LLC Award N0017825PC618
  2. Jun 28, 2012$1.8M from Defense Contract Management Agency: Jpeo jtrs enterprise license renewal7 To GREEN HILLS SOFTWARE LLC Award N6523612C3279
  3. Jun 30, 2008$1.4M from Department of the Air Force: 7030pgamasolx adamulti & ada95 compiler, licenses8 To GREEN HILLS SOFTWARE, INC. Award FA822408C5043
  4. Jun 1, 2022$1.4M from Department of the Air Force: Green hills software9 To GREEN HILLS SOFTWARE LLC Award FA857122P0078
  5. Aug 9, 2024$1.2M from Department of the Navy: Gs-i178t64gos-lin-ia10 To GREEN HILLS SOFTWARE LLC Award N0017824PC619