InformationWeek

IBM Laying Mac Clone Foundation?

Contract with Apple and talks with Radius suggest long-range plan

By Brian Gillooly
Issue date: July 3, 1995

Rumors about IBM's intentions to license the Apple Macintosh operating system for building its own Mac clones have persisted for years. While IBM still insists it has no plans to do so until there's a common hardware platform, two developments indicate the company is already getting its feet wet.

Radius Inc., one of the few companies shipping Mac clones, and IBM are currently discussing an arrangement under which IBM's Charlotte, N.C., manufactur ing facility will build motherboards for use in Radius' Mac-compatible machines, according to sources familiar with the talks. Because this particular pact would be strictly a contract-manufacturing arrangement, IBM will neither license the Mac operating system nor build its own clones.

Jolt To The Market
Charles Fulghum, senior systems engineer with Scientific Applications International Corp. in Arlington, Va., says IBM's influence could jolt the Mac clone market in corporate America. "Even if they're just building motherboards, it's still a stamp of approval," he says.

A possibly greater market impact, however, may result from a manufacturing deal signed with little fanfare by IBM and Apple in late May for the Asia-Pacific region.

IBM's Wangaratta, Australia, facility will build CPU daughtercards for Apple's Power Macintosh systems and ship them to Apple's Singapore assembly plant for use in systems sold throughout the Pacific Rim.

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