IBM has formed an industry consortium chartered with opening up the process of building Power processors, as used in Macs. It's a move to open up its Power microprocessor architecture. The consortium is called Power.org. The organization aims to give IBM's partners better access to Power technology so they can more easily build things like processor simulators, compilers and algorithm sets.
It will also give them a way to develop and share common power components themselves, without having to work directly with IBM, as is presently the case. "This is not just a business partner program," said Mike McGinnis, IBM's program director for PowerPC licensing, "This is a collaboration. It's giving these partners a say in where the architecture is going."
Apple not a member yet
The consortium is comprised of 15 companies from the software, consumer electronics, automotive and networking industries, including Sony, Cadence Design Systems, Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, Novell and Red Hat. Some prominent Power licensees like Toshiba and Apple Computer were not on the list of members, but IBM expects to announce new members in the weeks ahead.
News source: Macworld | UK
