n fairy tales, the princess meets the prince; They fall in love, get married and live happily ever after. But this story is not about a marriage of love but a marriage out of convenience. Both of them have been going through personal crisises. Now they come together and lean on each other. They put all their hope in a child and wish for a brighter common fate for all three.

Since Apple Computers and IBM agreed on joint ventures four years ago, the computing world has been waiting for an earth shattering outcome from the pair. First came the PowerPC RISC processor. The opportunity, however, to upset Intel was lost when IBM failed to bring PowerPC to the market in time and also due to the need for native application base. Although Apple has successfully changed their product line from the 68000 series processor to the PowerPC line, the impact on the market has not been dramatic. The next wave of attack in this joint venture is the PowerPC processor based Common Hardware Reference Platform (CHRP).

At COMDEX this fall, Apple formally announced that they are adopting the specifications for CHRP, the CHRP is intended to support IBM's AIX and OS/2, Apple's MacOS and Microsoft's Windows NT. The common platform is to be based on common memory and bus controller, Motorola is responsible for the memory controller and PCI bridge chips. The Mac I/O chip and the PC I/O chip come from Apple and IBM, respectively. CHRP will host different OS but still use the same device.

The marriage between these two companies is ironic. When Apple Computers first introduced their Macintosh, they released a ferocious advertisement campaign comparing IBM to the brain washing big brothers in George OrwellÕs novel 1984. IBM gradually lost its market share of personal computer to clone makers. The PC market has been a virtual free market since. Apple Computers, on the other hand, tightly guarded their MacOS and had a monopoly on Macintoshes. It is not until recently Apple Computers has begin to license MacOS.

Although there has been a switch of positions in the two companies; Both are experiencing problems. IBM's bread and butter business has been the mainframe computers. Today, most of the mainframes are nearing the age of retirement. The are a dying breed replaced by an increasing powerful and promising workstations. Nor has IBM been able to mount a dramatic come back in the fast growing personal computer markets. Although IBM is present is both the workstation and personal computer market it exists as a mere player among others. Not to mention its operating system OS/2 has not been able to withstand Windows' popularity. While IBM is still a strong company it no longer exerts the power over market it once did.

While Apple's operating system has been in numerous ways superior to DOS. Apple was never able to gain an impressive market share. Perhaps their graphical user interface just wasn't practical at time when computing powers are not adequate to handle multimedia or perhaps the multimedia capability just wasn't necessary until the Internet explosion. But perhaps the most fatal of all mistakes is the lack of licensed partner which has kept the price high and made the supply inflexible to market demands. Just recently, Apple experienced a serious supply shortage in the face of an increasing demand. There has even been rumor that Apple Computers will be bought out in the near future by corporations ranging from Hewlett-Packard to IBM.

The market of the Macintosh and PC has been merging. Right after Microsoft's release of Windows 95, Apple released another ferocious advertisement campaign attacking Windows as being Macintosh-like. Perhaps Apple Computers "has protest too much." As much as Microsoft has adapted itself to certain Apple innovations. Apple's Macintosh has adapted PC's features as well. Apple's keyboard for Power Macintosh looks remarkably similar to that of PC's. Apple also has implemented Intel's PCI bus over their aging NuBus.

The CHRP PowerPC may very well be a timely product. But how will IBM and Apple Computers' attempt to combine the best of PC and Apples do on the market? Will it be the killer computer that eliminates the need for the cross-platform nuisances of today? Or will this be merely be a computer no different from a Macintosh with a PC card? PC already supports Windows 95, Windows NT, OS/2 and Linux. There doesn't seem to be a clamoring need for the addition of MacOS.

Even if CHRP succeed it may not guarantee the future of IBM and Apple Computers. As clone makers have taken the control of the market out of the hands of the Big Blue. CHRP's flexibility in replacement parts will perhaps take the control of the market out Apple and IBM's hands, as well. Apple may suffer loses in hardware licensing revenues. The mobility between operating system can be another double edged sword for Apple. Nonetheless, the stake seems to be even higher for IBM which has suffered more blunders in recent years.

© Trincoll Journal, 1995.