Richard, what you reported is a sad story indeed, but nothing more than a single event. Also, what has this to do with their mainstream products, their microcontrollers?

I could tell you a similar story about Philips who promised that a certain micro will not become obsolete, but did finally, which threw us nearly out of business. Or I could tell you a story about Texas Instruments who promised us the availability of dies of a certain OPamp, which we wanted to put into a thickfilm modul. Finally we couldn't get any die and the entire and expensive thickfilm modul project "died". Or I could tell you a story about Analog Devices who changed the design of an analog switch originally showing ultra low charge injection, then becaming a chip showing ultra high charge injection, without mentioning anything about this in the datasheet and without telling us what's going on when we contacted them. Or I could tell you a story about Maxim who promised to be able to deliver a certain HF-Opamp, but finally could not. Or I could tell you a story about Burr-Brown who had an application note of a diamond transitor chip, which was entirely wrong and could never work as shown. Even when we could prove them, that this is a crapy design, they insisted on their circuit. Or I could tell you a story about a chip from Siemens which came in a 16pin package but datasheet said 14pin package. And and and...

And each time we had contact with a single idiot, who promised and gypped and swindled. But do I say, that I do never use chips from Texas Instruments, or from Burr-Brown, or from Siemens, or from Analog Devices any longer?? Of course, not!

Kai