This article is more than 1 year old

IBM Micro to go Slot One in 1999

We look for the smoking pistol

A year ago From The Register, 20 May 1998 IBM Microelectronics will produce a Slot One microprocessor in 1999, prompting speculation as to whether it is using an Intel licence, a licence from National Semiconductor-Cyrix, or has entered an unholy alliance with AMD.

The company will introduce Slot One models in 1999 dubbed the PR333, the PR350 and the PR400. IBM Microelectronics gave no indication last Monday as to where the technology came from. Graham Jackson, technology marketing manager at Cyrix Europe, said that his company had the capability to make a Slot One processor but so far had not decided whether to do so or not.

"Our agreement with IBM is a wafer agreement but we're competitors in the marketplace," he said. The agreement for IBM to fab its parts expires at the end of the year and that means National Semiconductor will fab its own Cyrix parts.

An Intel representative said: "We have confirmed we have licensed a third party and that will make chipsets. In terms of the design of Slot One, we're not licensing the design to third parties. Although information about Slot One is publicly available, how it slots into Intel technology is proprietary."

Joe D'Elia, senior analyst at Dataquest UK, said: "This doesn't surprise me. IBM now has to build for IDT, Cyrix and AMD. I can't see Cyrix will carry on using IBM Microelectronics to make its chips for much longer." No-one from IBM Microelectronics would comment but a representative from AMD said his company was "definitely not" producing a Slot One solution. ®

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