Editing Symbolics (section)

===Endgame===
As quickly as the commercial AI boom of the mid-1980s had propelled Symbolics to success, the ''[[AI Winter]]'' of the late 1980s and early 1990s, combined with the slowdown of the [[Ronald Reagan]] administration's [[Strategic Defense Initiative]], popularly termed ''Star Wars'', [[missile defense]] program, for which the ''Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency'' ([[DARPA]]) had invested heavily in AI solutions, severely damaged Symbolics. An internal war between Noftsker and the CEO the board had hired in 1986, Brian Sear, over whether to follow Sun's suggested lead and focus on selling their software, or to re-emphasize their superior hardware, and the ensuing lack of focus when both Noftsker and Sear were fired from the company caused sales to plummet. This, combined with some ill-advised real estate deals by company management during the boom years (they had entered into large long-term lease obligations in California), drove Symbolics into [[bankruptcy]]. Rapid evolution in [[mass market]] [[microprocessor]] technology (the ''[[History of personal computers|PC revolution]]''), advances in Lisp [[compiler]] technology, and the economics of manufacturing custom [[microprocessor]]s severely diminished the commercial advantages of purpose-built Lisp machines. By 1995, the Lisp machine era had ended, and with it Symbolics' hopes for success.

Symbolics continued as an enterprise with very limited revenues, supported mainly by service contracts on the remaining MacIvory, UX-1200, UX-1201, and other machines still used by commercial customers. Symbolics also sold Virtual Lisp Machine (VLM) software for DEC, Compaq, and HP Alpha-based workstations ([[AlphaStation]]) and servers ([[AlphaServer]]), refurbished MacIvory IIs, and Symbolics keyboards.

In July 2005, Symbolics closed its [[Chatsworth, California]], maintenance facility. The reclusive owner of the company, Andrew Topping, died the same year. The current legal status of Symbolics software is uncertain.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.unlambda.com/cadr/cadr_faq.html|title=MIT CADR Lisp Machine FAQ|website=Unlambda.com|access-date=27 May 2024}}</ref> An assortment of Symbolics hardware was still available for purchase {{as of|2007|August|lc=y}}.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.lispmachine.net/symbolics.txt |title=Symbolics |website=lipsmachine.net |access-date=27 May 2024}}</ref> In 2011, the [[United States Department of Defense]] awarded Symbolics a 5 year contract for maintenance work, ending in September 2016.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Definitive Contract PIID W91WAW11C0055 |url=https://www.usaspending.gov/award/CONT_AWD_W91WAW11C0055_9700_-NONE-_-NONE- |access-date=27 May 2024 |website=www.usaspending.gov |language=en}}</ref>