Because of its other – unique – properties the Inmos International Plc Transputer is not often thought of as a RISC but RISC it is. RISC processor shipments more than doubled in 1990 compared with the previous year, rising to 858,000 from 411,000, according to the RISC Management Newsletter. It says the installed base of RISC systems now exceeds 1.5m. Transputers came out tops with 240m processors shipped, followed by the Sparc with 185m, MIPS Computer Systems’ R Series with 90m, Advanced Micro Devices’ Am29000 at 85m, Intel’s 80860 and 80960 with 65m each, Acorn’s Computers’ ARM with 55m and Motorola’s 88100 trailing at 50m. Meanwhile the Electronic Industries Association of Japan reports that the market for semiconductors in Eastern Europe will not start materialising until the end of the decade. The EIAJ estimates Eastern Europe’s demand at $710m in 1989 – 1.4% of total world demand. And after snatching the lead in sales of semiconductors, the US chipmakers’ trade organisation, the Semiconductor Industry Association, predicts that by 1998 Japan will account for 42% of the worldwide computer hardware market, compared with 41% for the US – it says Japanese manufacturers will assume control of the total data processing business soon after: the Association’s gloom is compounded by the fact that the electronic sector is the number one manufacturing business in the US, bigger even than the auto industry.
