CNBC mentioned HP, IBM, and SUN as possibles.Lets look at the options:
HP? No way. HP is already transitioning it workstation and server business to WINTEL, redirecting (or excessing, in HP-speak) tons of people from the workstation business to other parts of the company. Dick Watts, who runs the computer systems biz at HP, is a brilliant guy, and he has set his course. SGI would be counter to that course.
IBM? Could be, after all they LOVE patents and SGI has a nice portfolio. Would also give them a Silicon Valley Systems base, and some pretty nice scalable networking chips.
SUN? Most likely. They are the ONLY other company committed to RISC and to UNIX (for better or worse, McNeely is married to 'em.). AND they are right across the freeway!!!
Most likely: nobody. not yet, anyway. (I hope I'm wrong!)
Karl
(I used to work at HP, then Cray, then SGI.) |
