Thank you first of all to everyone who contributed their suggestions. I am sorry I could not reply earlier as I was out.

I am in favour of the sleep-wakeup-sleep methodology of saving power. But, wouldnt that solution increase the power burden again? Consider this as a justification of my statement.

The micro controller will sleep at approx 40-100uA depending on the type in use and maybe other factors internal to the controller(this is a guess-timate). Adding any other circuit even CMOS should and will contribute to power dissipation. So, I am wondering if there is a derivative just similar to the PIC suggested by Kalpak wherein I can get a wakeup on interrupt. I am not aware of such an IC in the 8051 range.

I will look up the LPC from Philips.

Currently I am working with the PIC 16F628 and find its sleep mode power impressive. Sleep mode power varies with the peripherals turned on within the IC. If there is an IC in the 8051 family that does works with a 6MHz clock, 3 timers (I need T2 for UART), flash, ISP, nanowatt saving mode, wakeup on interrupt(not on reset) please do let me know.

Thanks
Jerson