Transitive, a young British software company, was born to bridge the most daunting of gaps. In its six-year existence it has handled two big divides with assurance: first, it made a quantum leap to enable applications to run on different computer systems; and second, it crossed the gulf between Silicon Valley and its European home.

In Transitive’s offices in Manchester, dozens of computer scientists work on technology that allows applications written for one operating system and processor to run on a different system and processor, without the expense and complication of software rewrites. Eight time zones away in California, Transitive’s chief executive and marketing staff are finding growing enthusiasm for their product from some of the biggest names in computing.