December 11, 1988

INTEL TAKES A RISC: Much speculation is surrounding which chip Apple Computer may pick for the RISC-based
workstation it’s expected to ship some time before the Apocalypse. You know the players — Motorola (some say 60 percent of its business comes from Apple), Mips Computer Systems (hottest RISC on the market), Advanced Micro Devices (mostly used in embedded applications), Sun Microsystems (doubtful, since the two companies are starting to hiss and spit at each other), Intergraph (sells the fast but low profile Clipper chip).

But insiders say the competition has narrowed to two, one a real shockaroo: Motorola, as expected, and Intel! Dark-horse Intel supposedly has an RISC chip so fast, functional and well-designed that it may blow the socks off everyone including Mips, the present technology leader.

Two interesting things about this Intel chip, called the R10: It’s supposedly a skunkworks project from Israel, of all places. (Skunkworks refers to a special project done by a secret, informal group of engineers, usually working offsite.) It hands-down beat another Intel RISC project also under way in Oregon.

Second, Apple engineers have historically hated Intel. That this chip made it inside and is actually being promoted by Apple engineers should make the RISC industry sit up and take notice.

WHAT’S IN A NAME? The name of Andy Seybold crossed my desk twice last week, and if that’s not a sign to write an item, I don’t know what is. First crossing was for an Old Timers Night party at next year’s fall Comdex, the mega computer show.

Seybold sent a letter to PC vendors last week, calling for a get-together that would reunite industry veterans. To get one of the limited invites “a person would have to prove that they were involved in the PC (side of the) industry on the day IBM announced their first PC (August 1981). Invitations will be limited to people who can prove their status.”
Seybold and partner Peter Francis want to put on “more than just another party,” with a display of some of the equipment that was on the market way back when, and “maybe (with) some fun type of award for some of the more notable people.”

They’re looking for funding, equipment for the display and maybe a contribution toward an award or two. “This should be an industry sponsored event, and as such, should not cost any one vendor a large sum of money,” they say.

Second desk-crossing: I heard Seybold was going bankrupt, but it’s not true. His former namesake, The Seybold Group, filed for Chapter 11 on Nov. 18 (while everybody was at this year’s Comdex). Francis said Seybold Group hasn’t used the Seybold family name since summer 1987 when it became Infonetics. The Seybold Group was listed on court documents for the sake of creditors who knew it when.

Seybold completely severed his relationship with Infonetics in January and now consults and publishes The Andrew Seybold Outlook on Professional Computing with Francis, who is managing editor.

QUICK HITS: Despite Motorola’s vehement denials, my sources swear that Motorola and Mips were indeed engaged in discussions about the possibly of Motorola manufacturing and/or using the Mips RISC chip. In fact, a letter of intent to do business was signed when Examiner reporter Paul Freiberger broke the story Thanksgiving Day. The deal wasn’t called off by Motorola until a Nov. 30 meeting almost a week later, sources say…. The founder of Lotus Development, Mitch Kapor, has signed a contract with Doubleday to write a book called “The Ecology of Innovation.” Sources say it’ll be an ideas book, and will draw on the experiences and thinking of a lot of people in the industry…. Joke of the week: Did you hear that Lotus and Ashton-Tate are planning to merge? Their ticker symbol will be LATE. (Both companies are notorious for not getting products shipped on time.)

DAIR TO HELP: A small, non-profit group in the East Bay has the only known archive of some 60,000 articles chronicling everything written about AIDS since the epidemic began. Started by a rehabilitation nurse and a professional archivist, the foundation — called DAIR, for Documentation of AIDS Issues and Research — is looking for money, equipment and volunteers to help get the articles on-line and/or microfiched for distribution to libraries and whoever else wants it. Bruce Linde, an engineering services supervisor at Sun/TOPS in Alameda, is the group’s treasurer and is spearheading the fundraising effort. If you want to help, call (415) 552-1665.