Insisting it is not simply responding to the avalanche of recent PowerPC announcements in that area, Sun Microsystems Inc’s chip unit, Sparc Technology Business, will unveil a strategy for Sparc-based embedded systems development at the forthcoming Embedded Systems conference, which runs from September 12 to 14 in San Jose. Instead of throwing whole workstation-based implementations at embedded problems, the unit said it will define chip-, board- and operating system-level strategies, taking it through the Sparc V9 architecture, on which its forthcoming 64-bit UltraSparc is based. It said it is not interested in the low-end, consumer device-oriented sector of the market, but in the 20 page per minute, and above, networked printers, the type of printer that International Data Corp forecasts the US market will absorb 475,000 of a year by 1998; 31 page per minute and above digital copiers, reckoned at 347,000 units a year by 1998; telephony servers and related equipment, 250,000 units by 1998; and intelligent switched hubs and routers, 588,000 units per year by 1998. Sparc Technology claims it will have significant product announcements in these areas within six months. It touts Sparc and Solaris’s advantage as the absence of a cross-compilation requirement between development and deployment systems. The unit currently offers microSparc I, II and SuperSparc-based embedded offerings direct, OEM and via other licensing arrangements. Deployment partners include Matra MHS SA, Force Computers Inc, Pinnacle Data Systems Inc, Themis Computers Systems Inc and Philips Electronics NV. Embedded Sparc development packages are available from Chorus Systemes SA, Lynx Holdings Plc, Cadence Design Systems Inc, Mentor Graphics Corp and Wind River Systems Inc. Embedded business accounts for 50% of the units non-Sun business. Sparcsystem builders make up the rest.
