Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pt.cs.cmu.edu!a.gp.cs.cmu.edu!koopman From: koopman@a.gp.cs.cmu.edu (Philip Koopman) Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth Subject: Re: Forth Engines / Harris Summary: don asbestos clothing before reading Message-ID: <11346@pt.cs.cmu.edu> Date: 10 Dec 90 18:31:42 GMT References: <2079.UUL1.3#5129@willett.pgh.pa.us> Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI Lines: 94 > F.SERGEANT [Frank] writes: > PK> The sad fact is that Harris can't sell an RTX for $15 > ... I contend that at most only the marginal costs should be > considered now. Consider the rest gone. Now they can get into the uP market > "for free." Frank, I don't mean to vent all this at you personally, but I'm worn down with discussions of the form "why can't Harris give us a break and price the RTX cheaply for the Forth community -- we'll support it ourselves". The response may be uncharacteristically blunt (then again, maybe not ;->), but I hope to drive home the reality of the situation. Once again, I do not speak officially for Harris. A) Harris doesn't care about the Forth community. Individuals in the former RTX group did (mostly Tom Hand, Rick VanNorman and myself), but we're all gone now. Harris Semiconductor (the corporation) cares only about making a profit, not about the success of Forth. And, they're in the middle of a nasty cash crunch, so they're not likely to cut anyone any slack at all. Their current strategy is to "de-emphasize" digital (that's PR talk, you know what they really mean). RTX is digital --> it has been de-emphasized. The RTX was given special treatment while Harris looked for external support funding (otherwise, I would have been unemployed in June instead of November). It didn't happen; case closed. It can be argued that the RTX would still be alive today if it had immediately concentrated on C instead of the "lunatic fringe" Forth community (I have heard these actual words used to describe it within Harris). Certainly that was the long range plan developed in the past year. The total Forth market for RTX is too small to make it worth Harris' while to pursue, at *any* realistic price or profit margin. B) Harris can't/won't sell the RTX cheaply (does it *really* matter which is the case? -- but I truly believe that "can't" is the actual situation). They are geared up for high-margin medium-volume specialty chips (the 80C286 is an exception). They have high overhead (don't forget, even without support they have to pay for production, storage, shipping, order entry system, local sales offices, distributor markup). With 2 micron technology, it is just very hard to get the price down. It is impossible with sales of less than 10,000-100,000 at a whack (large production runs allow improved yield as the fab process is tweaked for that product). C) Harris can't afford to sell the RTX "without support". They run the risk of getting a big customer for other products upset with poor support. Putting the Harris nameplate on implies a particular level of support. I suppose they could put a different "generic" nameplate on -- but why bother? Harris has no vested interest in seeing Forth engines succeed in the general marketplace, and the $$$ aren't there to justify it. D) One of the serious problems the RTX group faced was that Harris killed the pre-production 1 micron process lines we were planning to use. IMHO, they were already dead and we simply got the coroner's report. At last check, there was no reasonable path for RTX within Harris (including RCA, GE, Intersil) to 1 micron except for military products. Of course, things may have changed and my information may be inaccurate. But, I recall a lot of effort looking for external silicon vendors (think of what it implies when Harris asks someone else to make silicon!). Don't expect any breaks from Harris -- they don't perceive that they owe anything to the Forth community! So, if the Forth community wants the chip, how can it get it? 1) Someone break a few piggy banks and place that order for 100,000 pieces. I bet you get a good price. You might even get Harris to form a support group. 2) Someone buy a license for the RTX and produce it on a 1.0 micron fab (less up-front cash than method 1, and probably smarter too). Be ready to do complete marketing and support. If you can't get orders for 50,000-100,000 parts, I bet you go bankrupt. If the orders come in 1 or 10 at a time, I bet you also go bankrupt. 3) Buy chips from Silicon Composers or wherever (hey, how come they aren't selling at $15 either?) In summary -- ENOUGH ALREADY!! Harris isn't going to wave a magic wand and make things better! They had excellent business reasons (not technical ones) for what they did. None of these reasons had much to do directly with the RTX. Get serious and take action, or stop beating the dead horse! If you want to get serious, the first step is to pick up the phone and talk to Fred Hawkes at Harris (407) 724-7823. If you can't do that, you haven't earned the right to complain, gripe, grumble, mutter, protest, whine, wheedle, or demand better treatment. If you expect Harris to take any further action on its own, you are sadly mistaken. Phil Koopman koopman@greyhound.ece.cmu.edu Arpanet 2525A Wexford Run Rd. Wexford, PA 15090 *** this space for rent *** I don't speak for Harris; I don't even work for them.