Both Motorola and IBM have declared the termination of their MacOS sublicensing agreements. This means that Motorola, IBM, and all the sub- licensers of the MacOS that had agreements with these two companies will now be leaving the Mac hardware business (well, IBM never released Macs under its name anyways, they were released as Apples). This means that only UMAX and PowerTools actually have extended licenses with Apple to produce Macs.
Last week I said I was not going to comment further on the clone situation until Apple announced what is going on but I will say this, with so many companies leaving the Mac market, most saying they will wind up operations by December 31st, it is a good time to get a new Mac. Prices will fall as companies clear stock.
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MacWorld articles on IBM's Mac licensing and Motorola's exit.
Newton Reabsorbed into Apple
Apple has decided that it will not spin off its Newton Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) into its own company as had been planned, but will instead keep it as part of the greater Apple company. This has led to speculation that Apple is intent on forging ahead into the Network Computer (NC) hardware market. Keeping control of the future planning of Newton PDA's would allow Apple to both borrow Newton technology for its NC's, as well as guide the future development of the Newton so that it is more compatible with the NC.
Again I'll withhold comment until Apple announces what it is doing, but I will say that only Apple's handling of clones is keeping the howls of derision from this announcement (relatively) quiet (as if anything Apple does can be done quietly).
Real PC released
Insignia Solutions has just announced the latest product in its PC compatibility range, Real PC is designed for people who wish to play DOS games on the Mac, it is a direct competitor to Connectix Corporation's DOS emulator Virtual PC. Insignia has a comparison of the features of the two emulators.
Real PC is about half the price of Virtual PC, but I have not seen any independent reviews comparing these products, so I don't know which is better yet.
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