Qualcomm has wrapped up its $1.4 billion acquisition of silicon design agency Nuvia, a transfer that may result in in-house Qualcomm CPU designs. The acquisition ought to permit Qualcomm to compete with Apple’s silicon division and concentrate on pushing larger, higher ARM chips into the laptop computer market. The deal was introduced in January 2021.
Do not feel unhealthy when you’ve by no means heard of Nuvia; the corporate was solely founded in 2019 and has by no means made a product. Nuvia was centered on constructing server chips, however Qualcomm appears primarily within the engineering pedigree right here, for the reason that firm was founded by three high-ranking engineers from Apple’s silicon division. Nuvia’s CEO, Gerard Williams, previously Apple’s chief CPU architect for practically a decade, is now Qualcomm’s SVP of engineering.
Apple is famously within the strategy of dumping x86 Intel CPUs to be able to roll out in-house ARM structure designs throughout the corporate’s complete laptop computer and desktop strains. Qualcomm desires to be right here to promote chips to all of the PC distributors that need to comply with swimsuit. Qualcomm’s press launch instantly aimed its new design useful resource on the market Apple is upending, saying, “The primary Qualcomm Snapdragon platforms to function Qualcomm Applied sciences’ new internally designed CPUs are anticipated to pattern within the second half of 2022 and will likely be designed for high-performance ultraportable laptops.” The decision-out that this acquisition will result in “internally designed CPUs” is a giant deal, since presently, Qualcomm solely ships flippantly custom-made, off-the-shelf ARM CPUs.
Apple’s ARM cores are trade main as a result of energy of the corporate’s CPU designs. Whereas Apple makes use of the ARM structure, the corporate ships completely customized, in-house CPU designs. Qualcomm’s SoC CPUs may be rebranded as “Qualcomm Kryo CPUs,” however they by no means deviate a lot from ARM’s for-sale CPU designs. The corporate’s high laptop computer chip, the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2, makes use of ARM Cortex A76 CPU cores. The highest smartphone chip, the Snapdragon 888, makes use of an ARM Cortex X1 core and Cortex A78 cores.
Stepping out from ARM’s shadow
Qualcomm president and CEO-Elect Cristiano Amon says the acquisition will permit Qualcomm to develop “differentiated merchandise with main CPU efficiency and energy effectivity.” At the moment, Qualcomm’s differentiation within the SoC market primarily depends on its modem applied sciences (therefore the corporate’s frenzied promotion of 5G), its Adreno GPU division (which was ATI’s Imageon division earlier than it was acquired in 2009), and its aggressive patent licensing scheme, which locks out opponents. Having a top quality CPU design home would properly spherical out the corporate.
ARM’s CPU designs are utilized in principally each sort of computing gadget on earth: servers, smartphones, tablets, laptops, vehicles, IoT merchandise, possibly a desktop or two, and 1,000,000 different issues. Having to spin this many plates without delay means ARM needs to be extra of a generalist than you may desire when you’re making an attempt to compete with a laser-focused CPU design home like Apple.
One space of low-hanging fruit is the lower-power CPU cores that usually ship in Qualcomm’s SoCs. Excessive-end ARM chips often have a “massive.LITTLE” design, with a set of 4 higher-power, sooner chips for foreground processing and a set of 4 lower-power, slower cores for background processing and standby work. The upper-power cores are up to date yearly, however the lower-power cores are solely up to date about each 4 years. The Cortex A53 was the low-power resolution for 2012-2016, and immediately the traditional Cortex A55 cores, from 2017, are nonetheless delivery within the Snapdragon 888 and 8cx Gen2. If you happen to abruptly end up with extra CPU design assets, placing the facility effectivity elements on a yearly cadence looks as if a very good place to start out.
Even beneath the constraints of off-the-shelf ARM designs, laptop computer SoCs have been an afterthought in Qualcomm’s lineup. The corporate’s flagship 2021 Snapdragon 888 smartphone SoC is a cutting-edge design primarily based on the most recent ARM X1/A78 design and constructed on the most recent 5nm manufacturing course of, however Qualcomm’s laptop computer chips are two generations behind the smartphone designs. The present Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2 laptop computer SoC was solely introduced three months earlier than Snapdragon 888, however the mixture of an ARM Cortex A76 CPU and a 7nm manufacturing course of makes it equal to the Snapdragon 855, a smartphone SoC launched in 2019.
The present ARM X1 design answered calls for for a much bigger, higher-power ARM chip. On one hand, it is a disgrace that Qualcomm did not push the chip into the laptop computer SoC in a well timed method, because it looks as if the precise path for a laptop computer. However, the X1 is an efficient instance of how uncompetitive Qualcomm would have been with a reliance on an ARM design roadmap. Once more, ARM is a generalist, and “Greater and higher-power” for ARM nonetheless is not larger and higher-power sufficient to compete with Apple. The 2021, Cortex X1-based Snapdragon 888 nonetheless cannot compete with the 2020 Apple A14 Bionic in CPU benchmarks, not to mention the top-of-the-line Apple M1 chip. ARM simply is not producing designs with Apple’s laptop computer and desktop energy targets.
Whereas laptops are the primary goal for Qualcomm, the corporate is not stopping there. Qualcomm’s press launch says the corporate “expects to combine next-generation CPUs throughout a large portfolio of merchandise, together with powering flagship smartphones, laptops, and digital cockpits, in addition to Superior Driver Help Methods, prolonged actuality, and infrastructure networking options.” That assertion appears to particularly snub smartwatches and desktops, however it’s a begin.
