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Apple Is Making Its Own Modem To Compete With Qualcomm, Report Says (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Apple is apparently working on its own, in-house developed modem to allow it to better compete with Qualcomm, according to several new Apple job listings that task engineers to design and develop a layer 1 cellular PHY chip -- implying that the company is working on actual, physical networking hardware. Two of the job posts are explicitly to hire a pair of cellular modem systems architects, one in Santa Clara and one in San Diego, home of Qualcomm. That's alongside several other job postings Apple has listed in San Diego for RF design engineers. The Information, which spotted the first job posting, cites sources that go a step further, claiming that Apple is not only potentially working to develop its own modem, but is in fact specifically targeting it for use in future iPhones, with the company looking to leave longtime partner Intel behind in favor of its own, in-house solution.
According to The Information's report, the new modem would still be years away, with even Apple's purported 5G iPhone slated for 2020 using Intel's in-development 5G modem instead. It makes sense logically, too -- if Apple is only just starting to hire now, it'll take at least a few years before it'll actually be ready to ship hardware. But the move would have big ramifications for the mobile space, particularly for Qualcomm and Intel, two of the biggest modem suppliers in the world.
According to The Information's report, the new modem would still be years away, with even Apple's purported 5G iPhone slated for 2020 using Intel's in-development 5G modem instead. It makes sense logically, too -- if Apple is only just starting to hire now, it'll take at least a few years before it'll actually be ready to ship hardware. But the move would have big ramifications for the mobile space, particularly for Qualcomm and Intel, two of the biggest modem suppliers in the world.
Apple is a massive failure when it comes to designing their own chips.
The are eight generations into their A4 to A12 ARM SoC. It is widely viewed as a big success. By controlling their own design, they can put all customizations on-die thereby cutting component count and reducing PCB size. They can also leave off everything they don't need, thus cutting power consumption.
I retired from QC in '08 after 20 years. Went sailing with a friend and her BF some 4-5 years later. He'd left a job at Texas Instruments and moved from Texas to San Diego less than a year earlier. He didn't want to talk about QC, but said he regretted making the move. A year or so later went sailing with the same friend, same BF (she'd dumped her hubby of 20-30 years and moved in with the BF), and a new guy. Dude I worked with at QC in the 90s. He was debating leaving, said the company had changed once Paul Jacobs took over (which was a few months after I retired).
Christmas parties? QC had awesome Christmas parties. Cancelled.
Summer picnics, aimed at the kids of worker bees? Used to be awesome, cancelled.
And neither Ken nor Bill wanted to talk about it, but the whole vibe was more hours for not only less money, but fewer intangibles like a subsidized cafeteria and flex hours not being as flexible.
Some of you may remember John Rogers. President of Comic Con, died a month back. He was my boss. He was 100% a company man, I could not see him leaving QC. His obit never mentioned QC, the impression was he didn't work for them anymore. On the one hand, I get that. He had to be worth millions. On the other hand, he was a company man, loved his job, and I honestly thought he would die filling out my performance review. Combined with everything else I've heard, QC may not be a good place to work anymore.
Oh, did I mention the local newspaper runs an annual Best Places to Work every year? For 20 years QC was on that list. They've been absent for 5-8 years now.
Oh yeah, they've had layoffs for 2-3 years running now.
As an interested observer (I still hold lots of stock) I have to wonder if QC is driving out the 20-30 year folks who know their tech, and not being somewhere younger folks (or older transplants) want to work.