Companies often downplay the amount of software modifications necessary to benefit from their hardware platform's strengths because quite often, platforms that cannot run software out of the box lose out compared to those that can.

By the time special chips were completed and mature, the developers of "mainstream" CPUs had typically caught up speedwise in the past, which is why we do not see any "transputers" (e.g. Inmos T800), LISP machines (Symbolics XL1200, TI Explorer II), or other odd architectures like the Connection Machine CM-2 around anymore.

For example, when Richard Feynman was hired to work on the Connection Machine, he had to write a parallel version of BASIC first before he could write any programs for the computer they were selling: https://longnow.org/ideas/richard-feynman-and-the-connection...

This may also explain failures like Bristol-based CPU startup Graphcore, which was acquired by Softbank, but for less money than the investors had put in: https://sifted.eu/articles/graphcore-cofounder-exits-company...