Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Amazon Considering Buying Texas Instrument's Chip Business

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the sale-on-graphing-calculators dept.

puddingebola writes "From the article, "Amazon is reportedly in 'advanced negotiations' to acquire Texas Instruments' OMAP chip division, bringing chip design for its Kindle tablets in-house, and helping TI refocus on embedded systems. The deal in discussion, Calcalist reports, follows TI's public distancing from its own phone and tablet chip business in the face of rising competition from Qualcomm, Samsung, and others, though Amazon taking charge of OMAP could leave rivals Barnes & Noble in a tricky situation.'"

11 of 108 comments (clear)

  1. Big Move by roidzrus · · Score: 4, Informative

    This is a big move for Amazon, especially considering their Kindle doesn't necessarily demand huge amounts of performance, especially not in comparison to the iPad and other high-end Android tablets. I never really thought they would go this way, but now I can't help but wonder if they're going to expand toward phones as well. It seems that they could have just as easily sourced chips from Qualcomm unless they had something huge planned.

    1. Re:Big Move by SJHillman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      eBook readers are less of a fad and more of an intermediary step between books and tablets. I have a Nook Color, which further blurs the line between the two (it's more of a tablet optimized for reading books and magazines).

  2. And the Beagleboard, Samsung Products, et al by eldavojohn · · Score: 4, Informative

    Amazon taking charge of OMAP could leave rivals Barnes & Noble in a tricky situation

    Also, I believe the BeagleBoard is the SoC OMAP3530 ... not to mention there's a bunch of Samsung products (since it was mentioned that they are "rising competition") that depend on the OMAP4xxx series like the Galaxy S II and Galaxy Tab 2 and Galaxy Nexus ... lot of BlackBerry devices on that list too. It's not just the Kindle Fire using OMAP4, there's a lot of current devices using OMAP3 & OMAP4.

    What's going to happen to all these devices when Amazon decides it doesn't make open source hobby boards or cell phones and condenses these SoCs down to just Kindle-related focus? I guess it'd be stupid to throw away all that business but anybody know what would happen to these?

    --
    My work here is dung.
    1. Re:And the Beagleboard, Samsung Products, et al by Svartalf · · Score: 4, Informative

      It should also be noted that if they sell the division, TI or it's successor in interest is OBLIGATED to fufill any obligations for supply lifetime on parts- period. For TI to have gotten the business in the first place, they'd have to guarantee it. It's how that part of the industry works.

      I can assure you that the vendors of these devices will have 5-10 year windows on parts that WILL be honored or Amazon and TI would be on the receiving (read: LOSING) end of a nasty breach of agreement lawsuit.

      --
      I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
  3. What? by Alwin+Henseler · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Call me ignorant, but since when is Amazon a company that develops hardware?

    I know Amazon has a big catalog, but customized / re-branded products aside, aren't they basically a box-moving company? What the *** are they doing in the chip development business? More specifically: what do they expect to do, that a specialist like TI can't do for them?

    1. Re:What? by SpzToid · · Score: 4, Informative

      Have you heard about the Amazon Kindle? About the only thing you can compare it to in terms of actual units sold is the iPad, so Amazon is in Apple's league. Yes, seriously, Amazon is huge in 'readers' which is a variant of tablets, I suppose as I don't have much experience with them myself.

      Just as Google developed the Chrome web browser so as to have direct influence over the presentation of the web, Amazon has created hardware readers to have direct influence over how electronic versions of its content are consumed.

      Neither wants to be at the mercy of some vendor, (and I'm thinking about you Adobe and your Macromedia Flash).

      --
      You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
  4. Misleading Title by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    OMAP is only one small part of TI's integrated circuit business.
     
    That said, I'd really prefer if they kept it. I really like what TI has been doing with OMAP lately. I'm afraid Amazon might ruin it for the rest of us.

  5. Not getting into the chip *making* business by robot256 · · Score: 4, Informative

    No one seems to have mentioned it yet, but it's worth pointing out that Amazon is presumably buying just the OMAP processor *design* unit, not the manufacturing unit. They will likely still use TI's foundries to make the parts, but Amazon will have control over the architecture and who gets the documentation.

    Also worth reinforcing that this is not a bad deal for TI. ARM CPUs are pretty much a commodity product at this point, without much room for differentiation unless you go hog wild with optimizations like Qualcomm has. TI's main business has always been in the low-level ASIC and microcontroller markets, where is has a very large, well-respected variety of parts and continues to improve them.

  6. Re:Whats the point of an intermediary step? by boristdog · · Score: 5, Informative

    Until tablets have a hell of a lot better battery life, e-readers are not a fad. I can take my e-reader on a month-long trip, read a couple hours every day and still be reading on the same charge when I get back. I charge mine once every couple of months.

    I think you miss the point that a lot of people use e-readers to read (a book replacement) rather than to surf the web or do e-mail (a computer replacement).

  7. Re:Whats the point of an intermediary step? by 0123456 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Its not like you need to train on an ereader first before you buy a tablet. They're a fad , nothing more. In 10 years they'll be just another long forgotten footnote in tech history.

    Tablets may be a fad, but they will still be here in ten years.

    Oh, you meant e-readers? They exist because they're a fsck-load easier for most people to read on than a backlit LCD, and because losing a $60 e-ink Kindle when you leave it on your chair by the pool is much less disastrous than losing a $600 iPad where you stored all your login passwords.

    Not only that, but before long e-ink e-readers will cost less than a hardback book. At that point they become pretty much disposable items.

  8. Re:Whats the point of an intermediary step? by Beorytis · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Also...

    Until tablets have a hell of a lot better battery life,

    and a display that's as comfortable as e-ink

    e-readers are not a fad.