Now that ICL Plc has announced the world’s first Viking-based Sparc machines, we asked them whether in fact they have any Viking chips to put in them. Turns out it’s not allowed to tell us because of some sort of Texas Instruments-Sun Microsystems non-disclosure embargo. ICL is also not allowed to tell us whether it has a Viking prototype, a Viking pre-production unit or even a Viking cardboard mock-up. What it is allowed to say is that it has working hardware, though what that means under the cirumstances is anybody’s guess. However, ICL has got itself a backdoor in the Alamo: its designs use an M-Bus, and if Viking is a no-show, ICL can simply substitute a more viable chip.
