Nippon Apollo Computer has made preparatory moves towards manufacturing in Japan by spinning out its specialist hardware integration arm and moving it into a new Integration and Distribution Centre to be built on the outskirts of Tokyo: this operation will marry Apollo CPUs sent from the US with disks and network controllers, printers, graphic displays and keyboards all sourced locally and chosen according to customer specifications; Japanese components already account for 30% to 40% of the value of Apollo’s systems sold there, and there is some financial advantage in local assembly of equipment to be sold in Japan, not least because it cuts lead times; arch-rival Sun Microsystems has plans to manufacture in Japan, Europe and Asia, but its main production base is still in the US.
