Editing Western Design Center (section)

{{Short description|American company}}
{{Confused|Western Digital}}
{{More citations|date=June 2023}}
{{Use American English|date=July 2022}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=July 2022}}
{{Infobox company
| name = The Western Design Center, Inc.
| logo = Western Design Center logo one-color.svg
| type = [[Privately held company|Private]]
| industry = [[Electronics]]
| fate = 
| predecessor = <!-- or: | predecessors = -->
| successor = <!-- or: | successors = -->
| founded = {{Start date and age|1978}}<!-- if known, add: |mm|dd --> in [[Mesa, Arizona]], United States
| founder = [[Bill Mensch]]
| defunct = <!-- {{End date|20yy|mm|dd}} -->
| hq_location_city = Mesa, Arizona
| hq_location_country = United States
| area_served = Worldwide
| key_people = Bill Mensch
| products = [[Microprocessor]]s, [[microcontroller]]s, support devices
| owner = Bill Mensch<!-- or: | owners = -->
| num_employees = 
| num_employees_year = <!-- Year of num_employees data (if known) -->
| parent = 
| website = {{URL|https://wdc65xx.com/}}

{{URL|https://www.westerndesigncenter.com/}}
}}

The '''Western Design Center''' ('''WDC'''), located in [[Mesa, Arizona]], is a company that develops [[intellectual property]] for, and [[license]]s manufacture of, [[MOS Technology 65xx]] based [[microprocessor]]s and [[microcontroller]]s. WDC was founded in 1978 by a former [[MOS Technology]] employee and co-holder of the [[MOS Technology 6502]] patent, [[Bill Mensch]].<ref>{{cite web |last=Cass |first=Stephen |date=September 16, 2021 |title=Q&A With Co-Creator of the 6502 Processor: Bill Mensch on the microprocessor that powered the Atari 2600 and Commodore 64 |url=https://spectrum.ieee.org/q-a-with-co-creator-of-the-6502-processor |work=[[IEEE Spectrum]]}}</ref> Prior to leaving MOS Technology in 1977 Bill was the microprocessor design manager at [[MOS Technology]].

Beyond discrete devices, WDC offers device designs in the form of [[semiconductor intellectual property core]]s (IP cores) to use inside other chips such as [[application-specific integrated circuit]] (ASICs), and provides ASIC and [[embedded system]]s consulting services<ref>{{cite web | url=https://wdc65xx.com/integrated-circuit | title=Integrated Circuit (IC) &#124; the Western Design Center, Inc }}</ref> revolving around their processor designs. WDC also produces [[C (programming language)|C]] [[compiler]]s, [[Assembly language#Assembler|assembler]]/[[Linker (computing)|linker]] packages, [[Simulation#Computer science|simulator]]s, development–evaluation [[printed circuit board]]s,<ref>{{cite web | url=https://wdc65xx.com/Single-Board-Computers | title=Single Board Computers (SBC) &#124; the Western Design Center, Inc }}</ref> and [[in-circuit emulator]]s for their processors.