One of the large problems is a shortage of some common part that is widely used. I recall when 74LS245 were selling for over $100 each to people with $500,000 m

One of the large problems is a shortage of some common part that is widely used. I recall when 74LS245 were selling for over $100 each to people with $500,000 machines that needed that part. During that shortage we actually built small boards with 3-4 lesser chips that fulfilled the need for the part. When a genuine 245 was obtained, it could be easily swapped in, but many machines lived out their full life with this kluge in it. That one series of chips built Future into the colossuss it is today because they had the smarts to get their engineers to spec in that family (and many others) and Future booked huge orders with Japanese suppliers and enjoyed huge margins. ClassIC did the same thing later. Now Asia dominates.