According to a recent article in the EE Times, Beijing-based PC OEM Lenovo many be entering the mobile chip design business. An anonymous source allegedly familiar with the matter has indicated that Lenovo will be expanding its Integrated Circuits design team to 100 engineers by the second-half of this year. Further, Lenovo will reportedly task the newly-expanded team with designing an ARM processor of its own to join the ranks of Apple, Intel, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Huawei, Samsung, and others.
It is unclear whether Lenovo simply intends to license an existing ARM core and graphics module or if the design team expansion is merely the begining of a growing division that will design a custom chip for its smartphones and Chromebooks to truly differentiate itself and take advantage of vertical integration.
Junko Yoshida of the EE Times article notes that Lenovo was turned away by Samsung when it attempted to use the company's latest Exynos Octa processor. I think that might contribute to the desire to have its own chip design team, but it may also be that the company believes it can compete in a serious way and set its lineup of smartphones apart from the crowd (as Apple has managed to do) as it pursues further Chinese market share and slowly moves its phones into the United States market.
Details are scarce, but it is at least an intriguing protential future for the company. It will be interesting to see if Lenovo is able to make it work in this extremely-competitive and expensive area.
Do you think Lenovo has what it takes to design its own mobile chip? Is it a good idea?
Good for Lenovo, the more the
Good for Lenovo, the more the merrier ARM technology has been good for everyone’s wallet for so long now! The great ARM wall of China, keeping the barbarians at Intel outside of everyon’s wallet, beacuse with Intel inside, too much cash will flow outside! Good for Apple too, Apple should require Intel to produce mobile CPUs without integrated GPUs in the MacBook Pros for customers that need professional grade GPUs!
You don’t have any idea what
You don’t have any idea what you are writing; isn’t it.. 🙂
It will be interesting to see
It will be interesting to see how much it will look like any current design. I also wonder if there will be a few patent lawsuits forthcoming. Regardless, China is after all the tech they can buy beg borrow or steal and I wonder how much resistance they will get from around the world when they have a few trillion to throw at things.
There is part of me that would like to see more competition in the processor arena, but like with many other things, there is a larger part of me that is saying “be careful what you ask for”.
I am actually the item listed
I am actually the item listed here, right?