A Year Ago: Intel, Sun to shake hands

Sun Microsystems Inc. and Intel Corp. are set to make a group of announcements today concerning Intel's 64-bit chip architecture, code-named Merced.

The announcement will reportedly concern cross-licensing of technologies, and an agreement by Sun to port its Solaris operating system to Merced, which Intel jointly developed with Hewlett-Packard Co.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the agreement calls for a patent cross-licensing that will allow the two companies to share semiconductor, computer-system and software technologies. It said Sun is also expected to adapt its version of the Unix operating system, called Solaris, to run on Intel's Merced chip.

Merced is expected out in 1999.

Material from Reuters was used in this report.