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To: Thomas G. Busillo who wrote (45780)	5/13/1999 11:19:00 AM
From: phbolton	Respond to of 53903

IBM Grabs Next Nintendo System Chip Contract (05/13/99, 7:03 a.m. ET) By Ron Wilson, EE Times In a stunning coup for its new Pervasive Computing strategy, IBM Microelectronics has won the design for the next-generation Nintendo game console ICs. The estimated $1 billion win, snatched from the jaws of long-time Nintendo partner NEC, has the potential to make IBM the dominant figure in ASICs at the 0.18-micron generation, and to establish the PowerPC as the highest-volume RISC processor. The new Nintendo system-code-named Dolphin-will rely on two key chips, both from IBM. The first chip, Gekko, will be a highly-customized PowerPC CPU and memory device, and the second will be a graphics engine. The CPU chip is being designed by IBM, and the graphics chip by Palo Alto start-up ArtX. The chips are expected to tape out shortly, on schedule for a Nintendo product launch in time for the year-2000 holiday season. The win was a stunning turn-about for Nintendo, which worked closely-in a highly-publicized relationship-with NEC, Silicon Graphics and SGI's MIPS subsidiary to develop the current Nintendo 64 console. "We have a long-standing relationship with NEC," said Nintendo software engineering manager Jim Merrick, "but IBM was there with unique price/performance, the right technology and perfect timing." "We brought our best design skills, our top technology and our production capabilities to the party for this," added IBM Microelectronics general manager John Kelly. "I think it was an important factor that we are already running our 0.18-micron production copper process in two fabs, and could show our ability to ramp to the kind of volume Nintendo needs on their schedule." A major implication of the choice for Nintendo is the move from the Nintendo 64's MIPS architecture to the PowerPC architecture. "PowerPC was a logical choice, and is attractive for a number of reasons," Merrick said. ''But as to whether we made the agreement because we wanted the PowerPC, I'd say it would be hard to break out just one piece of the agreement and say that it was the determining factor.'' The change of CPU architecture will have some impact on Nintendo's design process and possibly that of their game developers as well. Much code, including Nintendo's proprietary operating system, the game logic and physical simulation, must execute on the host CPU. But today much of that code is written in C. ''There are still some hand-crafted assembly routines, but they are a small, specialized subset of the code package,'' Merrick said.