[boot]

My take is that it's all about the execution of creating a chip. x86 for example is a much worse ISA, but there is some research (no source on this assertion) that says at the end of the day it doesn't matter too much since the machinecode is just translated into some internal RISC code.

So, it isn't that PowerPC is doomed from a technical standpoint. Instead it's all about money, business cycle stuff. Less sales means less R&D. Less R&D means you fall behind of the competition. IBM doesn't really have the heavy hitters they used to in the chip business (Relative to Intel/ARM/TSMC). If you want the newest flashiest tech, you can't really use their fab - that sort of stuff.

Every chip technology node is getting more expensive for foundries, which means the chip market will likely naturally converge to a small number of players.

[pbsd]

I believe you're thinking of this [1].

[1] http://research.cs.wisc.edu/vertical/papers/2013/hpca13-isa-...