Currently, Qualcomm employs ARM’s existing core designs and implements them in chips. With the Snapdragon 888, things have hardly changed, but it looks like Apple’s 5nm M1 silicon was needed to give Qualcomm the ultimate push.
Qualcomm’s Acquisition of Nuvia Could Help it Create Custom Core Designs Instead of Licensing Existing Ones
According to opinions of journalists like Stephen Ellis, WinFuture reports that in the future, Qualcomm isn’t going to be relying on simply licensing CPU designs developed by ARM for use in its own chips. While Qualcomm currently does this, its plan is reportedly to take on Apple by developing custom cores. With the Nuvia acquisition, the San Diego chipmaker has the opportunity to do just that.
Nuvia has an architectural license like Apple, which will allow Qualcomm to develop custom cores. According to Anshel Sag, it will also be cost-effective for the chipset manufacturer instead of licensing existing designs. The only question is, when do we aim to see these? It Turns out not very long if that is what Qualcomm wants. Previously, the company’s President praised Apple’s M1 chip, stating that this silicon was a step in the right direction.
Valid point. Wonder how long it'll be until Qualcomm goes to an architectural license like Apple, considering that is much lower cost than its current top-tier license.
— Anshel Sag (@anshelsag) February 3, 2021
Perhaps he was hinting that somewhere down the line, we’ll see a custom Qualcomm chip too. As it turns out, the firm is testing out what appears to be an M1 competitor with the internal number Snapdragon SC8280. Apparently, it was being tested on a 14-inch notebook, supports up to 32GB RAM, and sports an integrated 5G modem; both hardware additions are missing on the M1.
We hope this upcoming silicon fares better than the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2, and if it ends up being successful, perhaps we might see custom designs arrive for smartphone partners. Whatever is Qualcomm planning, though, it better move like it’s got a purpose because Samsung isn’t taking a break here. According to a tipster, the Korean giant could announce new Exynos chipsets with AMD GPUs as early as the second quarter of 2021, so there’s a lot to look forward to in the future.
News Source: WinFuture
