I'm remembering back to an interview with Wilf, so correct me if I dreamed this up, but I thought he said that the company was going to manufacture the best chip for this application or that application and just sell it to whomever wanted it. In such situations it would be up to the end seller to add value to the product through brand identification and personal design.
This may or may not be the best business model, but I sense that by doing this LSI becomes more the master of its own fate. On the one hand, they can wait for Sony to decide to build the next generation Playstation and order up the chip you've discovered, or, they can push the envelope by saying, " We can produce this thing right now. Who wants it?"
Then too, the rumor has been that Toshiba might get most of the action on the next generation Playstation. Should LSI wait to play second fiddle, or should it aggressively pursue the video game maker market by introducing their own single chip solution now?
But, you're right, it's all guesses.
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