Lieu : Le Drake Hotel, Chicago (Illinois)
Date:July 1989
Point of view: Omniscient (Focus on Lazare Bonaparte)
The thick blackout curtains in the Drake Hotel suite had just been drawn, blocking the lights of Chicago's skyscrapers. In the vast room with its dark woodwork, the silence was disturbed only by the twins' regular breathing.
Exhausted from their day in the hustle and bustle of CES, Minh and Linh had fallen asleep before they had even finished their dinner ordered from room service. The stuffed animals won in the afternoon were piled up at the foot of the bed. Lazare gently pulled the blanket up over his little sister's shoulder, then returned to the adjoining living room, bathed in darkness.
He sat down on the leather couch, took off his sneakers, and prepared to reread his notes on the disastrous architecture of the Macintosh and Compaq PCs he had mentally dissected a few hours earlier.
The suite's corded phone rang.
Lazarus unhooked the imposing Bakelite handset before the second bell so as not to wake the children.
"Yes?" he whispered.
"Shall I wake you up?" asked Alexandre de Vigan's crackling voice across the transatlantic line. The sales manager was calling from Paris, where the sun was just starting to rise.
"No. The children are sleeping. A problem at the factory? »
"At the factory, everything is fine," replied de Vigan, his breath slightly short. "Chicago is where we have a problem. Your anonymity has just been lifted. »
Lazarus frowned imperceptibly. "Expand."
"I was woken up half an hour ago by an old contact of mine, an associate at Merrill Lynch in New York," the sales manager explained, his voice strained. "Wall Street is a small village, Lazarus. Kourou's moves and the European telecoms contract are making a lot of noise in American investment banks. Your name has begun to circulate in circles of initiates. Someone cross-checked Air France's flight manifests and discovered that the CEO of the mysterious company Volta S.A. was staying at the Drake Hotel during the CES show. »
"It was bound to happen," Lazarus said calmly. "It doesn't matter, Alexandre. My flight home is in forty-eight hours. I don't have any interviews scheduled. »
"You don't understand," interrupted de Vigan. "It was not the press that had the information. Merrill Lynch has spilled the beans on one of its biggest customers in Silicon Valley. This man immediately diverted his private jet from San Francisco. He landed at O'Hare Airport two hours ago. Lazare, the CEO of Advanced Micro Devices is sitting in your hotel bar right now. It is waiting for you. »
Lazarus paused.
Jerry Sanders III. The founder and CEO of AMD. One of the most emblematic and sulphurous historical figures of the microprocessor wars.
The mind of the sixty-year-old engineer analyzed the situation in a fraction of a second. He was perfectly familiar with the industrial history of the eighties. In 1989, AMD was not yet the giant capable of competing on an equal footing with Intel. The Californian company was mired in a legal war to the death against its rival to obtain the right to manufacture clones of the 386 processor. Sanders was a cornered man, fighting for the very survival of his foundry.
"Very well, Alexander. Thank you for the warning," said Lazarus, rising.
"Do not grant him anything, Lazarus. It is an absolute predator. It has the reputation of... »
"I know his reputation, Alexander. Sleep easy. »
Lazarus hung up. He put his sneakers back on, checked one last time that the door to the twins' room was closed, and left the suite.
He took the elevator to the ground floor and headed to the *Coq d'Or*, the hotel's historic bar. The place was hushed, lined with mahogany woodwork, lit by dim brass lamps. A pianist was playing a muted jazz standard.
It didn't take him three seconds to spot his target.
Sitting alone in a leather alcove at the back of the room, Walter Jeremiah Sanders III stood out from the austerity of the place. AMD's CEO, in his flamboyant fifties, wore a pearl-gray Italian silk suit, a shirt open over a torso tanned by the California sun, and a heavy gold watch that caught the light. He looked like a Hollywood film producer, not an electronics engineer.
In front of him, a glass of bourbon half full.
Lazare approached the table, his hands in the pockets of his faded jeans. The white t-shirt he was wearing rubbed against the posh atmosphere of the establishment.
Sanders looked up. The Californian CEO, used to dealing with fifty-year-old executives in three-piece suits, was shocked for a moment when he discovered the real age of his target. But the Silicon Valley shark immediately regained control. He stood up, displaying a carnivorous smile of formidable charisma, and held out a perfectly manicured hand.
"Mr. Bonaparte, I suppose," Sanders said in his deep, gravelly voice. "Jerry Sanders. It's an honor to meet you. »
"Good evening, Mr. Sanders," Lazarus replied, shaking his hand, his grip firm but his face utterly indecipherable. "Your banker at Merrill Lynch is very efficient."
Sanders let out a small fat laugh and motioned for Lazarus to sit down across from him.
"Information is the sinews of war in our industry, Lazarus. Can I call you Lazarus? »
"Please."
The AMD CEO made an elegant gesture to the waiter to order a second drink. Lazarus stopped him with a glance. "Just a glass of ice water."
Sanders leaned back on the leather bench, crossing his legs. He studied the young man sitting in front of him. He expected to find an arrogant student or an impressionable little genius. He found a block of ice. Lazarus' dark eyes betrayed no intimidation, neither in front of the place nor in front of the financial empire that Sanders represented.
"I'll be frank with you, Lazarus," the American began, quickly dropping the frills. "I took a private jet this morning because an anomaly occurred on my European radar. A huge anomaly. I am a man who has been making silicon for twenty years. I know all the players in this market, from Osaka to Munich. And suddenly, last spring, I learned that IBM was being emptied of the Kourou space center by a company whose name no one knows. »
The waiter placed the glass of water in front of Lazarus. The latter did not touch him.
"Then, a few weeks ago, it was Motorola's patents that were being strangled in Paris," Sanders continued, resting his elbows on the table, leaning forward. "And I'm not even talking about the rumors circulating in the corridors of the Pentagon about the computer equipment of the French General Staff. They have become totally deaf to our proposals for equipment. »
Sanders took a sip of bourbon, pointing his glass at the young Frenchman.
"I paid a lot of money to find out who was pulling the strings, Lazarus. American industry is wondering what Europe is doing behind its back. The French state is using you as a battering ram to break our monopolies. »
"The French state is my client, Mr. Sanders. I respond to their calls for tenders. This is the principle of free trade, which your country cherishes so much, isn't it? Lazarus replied, his voice flat, almost bored.
The diplomatic dodge drew another smile from the Californian.
"Don't give me the official speech, kid," Sanders blurted out, his tone becoming more intimate, from leader to leader. "You have designed a new hardware architecture. It is said to be RISC, but with parallel computing power that defies understanding. This is the only rational explanation for what is happening on the other side of the Atlantic. »
Sanders put down his drink. The showman disappeared to make way for the surrounded industrialist.
"I'm the boss of Advanced Micro Devices, Lazare. And I'm at war. Intel is dragging me through federal court to cancel my manufacturing rights to the x86 architecture. They want an absolute monopoly. They want to suffocate me. My foundries are running, but I don't have the intellectual property to design the future without them. They hold me by the microcode. »
The admission was brutal. In the business world of the 80s, admitting a structural weakness to a competitor was suicidal. But Sanders had no choice. If he addressed this young Frenchman with such candor, it was because he was convinced that he had found the weapon that was going to save him.
"It's a very uncomfortable position, indeed," Lazarus said with the detachment of an entomologist watching a pinned insect. "But how do AMD's legal issues affect me?"
"They concern you because we have a common enemy, Lazarus. And because I have exactly what you lack to survive. »
Sanders sank back into the leather of the seat, pulling out the trump card he'd been preparing for the entire flight.
"You have the best architecture of the moment in Europe, that's a fact. But you're in a small factory in the suburbs of Paris. You do not have the lithographic production capacity to get out of your state contracts. To conquer the civilian world, to crush Intel, you need billion-dollar factories. Cutting-edge *fabs*. You don't have them. I do. »
The American CEO held out his hand, his palm open.
"Sell me a license of your architecture. Give me access to your CPU blueprints. I make them, I put them on the U.S. market under the AMD logo, and we share the billions. »
Location:The bar at the Drake Hotel, Chicago, Illinois
Date: July 1989
Point of view: Omniscient (Focus on Lazare Bonaparte)
Jerry Sanders sank into the leather bench, his eyes burning with the conviction that had made him a Silicon Valley legend. He had just laid down his cards, convinced that the lure of profit and American glory would sweep away the reluctance of any young European entrepreneur.
"Think carefully about what I offer you, Lazarus," insisted the AMD CEO, his voice vibrating with persuasion. "I am offering you a massive cross-licensing agreement. AMD purchases the rights to use your *VESLA* architecture. In exchange, I provide you with the striking power of our silicon foundries in Austin and Sunnyvale. We flood the U.S. market under the AMD brand. And on each chip sold, Volta S.A. receives royalties that will amount to hundreds of millions of dollars within two years. »
Sanders leaned in slightly, lowering his voice as if he were sharing a state secret.
"I'll let you in through the front door. I am sponsoring you for an IPO on Wall Street. At twenty-five, you will weigh more than the Rockefeller heirs. The engineering comes from you, the industrial strike force comes from me. The perfect combination. »
Lazarus did not move. His dark gaze remained fixed on the Californian industrialist, absolutely calm, almost disturbing. There was neither the spark of greed, nor the pride of being knighted by one of the masters of global computing.
Faced with this unfathomable silence, Sanders tried another approach. Benevolent intimidation.
"You are a genius, Lazarus. The DGA and Aérospatiale did not wait for me to understand this. But the institutional world is only a sandbox. The real market is the civilian market. And you are French. Your country, and Europe in general, have neither the culture of financial risk nor the supply chain to impose a global silicon standard. »
Sanders pointed his signet ring finger at the young man.
"If you try to conquer the consumer market on your own, with your factory in the suburbs of Paris, Intel will crush you. They'll launch armies of lawyers to lock you up at customs, and flood PC builders with their discounted chips until you go bankrupt. Let me be your shield. AMD makes your chip, and together, we break Intel's monopoly. »
The AMD CEO backed off, waiting for the reaction. He had used all the strings of his bow: flattery, money, fear and solution. In ninety-nine per cent of cases, the negotiation here ended with a handshake.
Lazarus looked at the glass of ice water placed in front of him. Condensation beaded on the crystal. He does not aim it.
"That's a fascinating offer, Mr. Sanders," Lazarus began in a flat, emotionless voice. "But the answer is no."
Sanders blinked, convinced that he had misheard. The showman's confidence wavered for a second.
"Excuse me? Lazarus, you didn't enter the amounts at stake. You... »
"I understood it perfectly," Lazarus cut him off coldly. "But you are misdiagnosed. You came to Chicago convinced that you were going to give alms to a European subcontractor. I am not anyone's subcontractor. »
The young Frenchman leaned against the back of the bench, crossing his arms. The power dynamic had just changed abruptly. The young man in faded jeans suddenly exuded the authority of a chairman of the board of directors reframing an offending employee.
"You want my architecture to save your foundry because Intel is suffocating you," Lazarus said with surgical frankness. "It's understandable. But selling my licenses to AMD would be the worst strategic mistake of my life. I'll explain why. I spent the afternoon at McCormick Place. I audited your industry. »
Sanders frowned. "Have you visited CES?"
"I tested the machines from Compaq, IBM, and Apple," Lazare continued. "And I saw a disaster. If I give you the blueprints for my *VESLA-II* processor, what will you do? You're going to melt it down and sell it to Compaq or Tandy for them to put into plastic cases. And on these machines, your customers will install MS-DOS or Windows 2.1. »
Lazarus let out a short, icy laugh, devoid of the slightest gaiety.
"It's like installing a Formula 1 engine in a farm tractor. Microsoft's code is an architectural garbage can, unable to manage protected memory. Apple's software crashes the entire machine if it accesses a wrong address. Your industry is mired in outdated software and choppy interfaces. »
Sanders tried to intervene. "It's the market standard! Software will improve with the power of our chips! »
"No. Hardware and software must be born together," Lazare decreed, stating the absolute dogma of his company. "This is the secret of Kourou and the French Defense. If my chip explodes all Soviet standards, it's because it's driven by *VoltaOS*. An operating system designed specifically for it, capable of doing real preemptive multitasking without ever crashing. One is worth nothing without the other. »
Lazarus leaned forward, his dark eyes riveted on those of the American CEO, who was beginning to realize the chasm between their respective visions.
"Selling my processor alone to AMD would be tantamount to restricting it. That's out of the question. I maintain absolute control over my hardware and software. The Volta ecosystem will remain totally closed and proprietary. None of your builders will have access to my patents. »
Sanders' hubris momentarily took over. The face of the Californian CEO hardens.
"You're making a fatal mistake, kid," Sanders hissed, dropping polite. "Do you think you can create an entire civilian computer from France? To make a place for yourself among the giants of Silicon Valley without alliances? You don't have the production apparatus! Intel produces 386 million processors per quarter. What is your pace in Ivry-sur-Seine? A few thousand servers per month, subsidized by your government? You will be dead before you even touch American soil. »
"I don't need Intel's factories or yours, Jerry," Lazarus replied, standing up.
He stared at the businessman, his silhouette cut against the light by the dim lighting of the jazz bar.
"You think like a man of the eighties. You believe that the power lies in owning the factory. I own the patents. And I know that Asia is full of foundries ready to etch silicon cheaply, as long as they are provided with the engineering. I will find the production capacity when I need it. »
Lazarus paused. He looked at the man who had built one of the most respected foundries in the United States and who had come to beg for his survival from a twenty-two-year-old Frenchman.
"I'm sorry for AMD's problems with the law, Mr. Sanders. Really. But I won't save you from your war against Intel. You are both representatives of an outdated technological model. And I didn't come to Chicago to choose which of the two dinosaurs I was going to ally myself with. »
Jerry Sanders remained silent, his fist clenched on the table, unable to find a response to a refusal of such arrogance and certainty.
"I have come to measure the effort it will take me to destroy you both," concludes the architect of the future with chilling indifference. "Have a great evening. And good flight back to California. »
Lazare Bonaparte turned on his heels. He walked through the bar at the Drake Hotel without a backward glance, leaving the AMD founder alone with his glass of warm bourbon and the sudden, terrifying certainty that Silicon Valley had just found a gravedigger.