Slashdot Mirror
Apple's Internal Hardware Team Is Working On Modems That Will Likely Replace Intel (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Apple will design its own modems in-house, according to sources that spoke with Reuters. In doing so, the company may hope to leave behind Intel modems in its mobile devices, which Apple has used since a recent falling out with Qualcomm. According to the sources, the team working on modem design now reports to Johny Srouji, Apple's senior vice president of hardware technologies. Srouji joined Apple back in 2004 and led development of Apple's first in-house system-on-a-chip, the A4. He has overseen Apple silicon ever since, including the recent A12 and A12X in the new iPhone and iPad Pro models.
Before this move, Apple's modem work ultimately fell under Dan Riccio, who ran engineering for iPhones, iPads, and Macs. As Reuters noted, that division was heavily focused on managing the supply chain and working with externally made components. The fact that the team is moving into the group focused on developing in-house components is a strong signal that Apple will not be looking outside its own walls for modems in the future. In recent years, Apple has been locked in a costly and complex series of legal battles with Qualcomm, the industry's foremost maker of mobile wireless chips. While Apple previously used Qualcomm's chips in its phones, the legal struggles led the tech giant to turn instead to Intel in recent iPhones.
Before this move, Apple's modem work ultimately fell under Dan Riccio, who ran engineering for iPhones, iPads, and Macs. As Reuters noted, that division was heavily focused on managing the supply chain and working with externally made components. The fact that the team is moving into the group focused on developing in-house components is a strong signal that Apple will not be looking outside its own walls for modems in the future. In recent years, Apple has been locked in a costly and complex series of legal battles with Qualcomm, the industry's foremost maker of mobile wireless chips. While Apple previously used Qualcomm's chips in its phones, the legal struggles led the tech giant to turn instead to Intel in recent iPhones.
I'll be interested in seeing how this turns out. Apple has had great success with their ARM SoC design, and I don't doubt they can design a modem and baseband, but will they be able to design something that provides similar performance to what Qualcomm produces. Intel hasn't had a lot of success outside of x86, so I don't know how much of their failings can be pinned on the company, but rolling your own hardware is no small task.
If nothing else, I suspect that there are some Qualcomm on Intel employees who work on these designs that are about to receive some job offers with very attractive salaries.
I'm surprised they taken until now to begin this. Having your own silicon design team, who have already produced the W2 chip for the ear buds (yeah I know different ball park but still a toe dipped in wireless), you'd think you'd have started this back when they picked a fight with Qualcomm.
Also with the perpetual drive to put everything on a single chip and use less space this seems like an obvious move.
I'm guessing it's their habit of focusing on just a few things (CPU, Graphics & AI silicon) that has taken a higher priority until now. But still, only now?
After they moved chip production in-house with their A-series, which has routinely been benchmarking far ahead of contemporary chips from Qualcomm, people started wondering when they'd do the same with cellular modems. Their recent spat with Qualcomm and their reliance on a lesser product from Intel may have hastened their decision to take it on themselves.
It'll be interesting to see if, when, and how it pans out. With their processors and GPUs, they were able to build on top of ARM and Imagination tech, respectively (though they're now doing their own thing with the latter), but what do they build on with modems? And how will they avoid Qualcomm's prodigious patent portfolio covering the technology?
Sort of disturbing in my opinion for Apple to take on yet another custom chip design. Apple has started taking steps to become the exclusive hardware maker for its products like back in the Power PC days. Tweaking a ARM chip is a lot different then creating a locked down modem design exclusive to Apple products. Makes me wonder what sort of scheme they have in mind?
Looks like the love affair between Apple and Intel might be on its last legs...
Wish authors would learn to write headlines...
If a surface mount chip goes on your phone, you toss the whole board. Reworking an SMC part would be cost-comparable to buying a new phone.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Actually.. it doesn't mean that at all.
It's just intolerable on LTE and 5G. This was a test I ran today of bloat on tethered android cell phone - 2+ seconds of observed delay: http://www.dslreports.com/spee... Early tests of 5G are equally dismal, with over 1.5 seconds of observed latency under load. As osx adopted fq_codel (RFC8290) last year for their wifi drivers, awareness of this problem has finally made it to at least some of Apple's upper management. Here's hoping it's made it to the lte folk there also!
To avoid licensing they will create a new standard which is bad for everyone.
apple will copy and steal that cast majority of Qualcomms patents and then drag Qualcomm through patent court for years.
Sounds about right for apple.
That Apple come out with a 56K modem.
The whole point of the RAND patent pool around standards for things like wireless modems, is exactly so there will not be a minefield - just a tollbooth of relatively known quantity.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
This is not the same as Apple and its A-series SoCs. Apple purchased licenses from ARM Holdings to produce their own ARM-based CPUs. There is no one single company Apple can go to to license the technology to produce its own baseband chipsets. Additionally, Apple is in a very public battle with Qualcomm about the very patents and licenses that underpin 3G/4G/5G baseband technology.
The patent licensing aside, one of the other Qualcomm lawsuits involves the violation of NDAs and Apple violating Qualcomm's baseband technology trade secrets. In order to integrate Qualcomm's chipsets into the iPhone, Apple entered into NDAs with Qualcomm for detailed technical information. Qualcomm alleges that Apple shared these secrets with Intel after Apple dumped Qualcomm chipsets. Even if Qualcomm cannot prove that Apple did this, it is going to be impossible for Apple to prove that they somehow did not use this same information to produce their own baseband chipsets. I believe this is a much bigger issue for Apple than the patent licensing issue. Undoubtedly there will be direct non-compete clauses in these NDAs.
Short of actually purchasing Qualcomm, or some other baseband chipset manufacturer, it will be impossible for Apple to show that they have come up with their own cleanroom implementation of baseband chipsets that is unencumbered by some kind of patent or licensing issue or NDA contractual issue.
This particular chip or sub chip is not really high end anymore, it’s easy to make a modem in house thats still faster then the network it’s connected to.
A simple cost saving equation, keep the simple stuff in house.
It will come at huge cost, increasing price of phones (gotta absorb R&D and production cost). Only companies specializing in modems make money from their production.
And good luck with entering that market and not infringing on some patents.
They'd be better off with making a joint venture with Intel.
You have successful platform (iOS), that you make obscene money off. So gotta let your suppliers profit too. I get that Broadcom wanted big piece of pie, but thet's where competition come into picture.
It is going to end up like their self driving car. All money in the world does not make you best in everything.
It is not that wireless networking comes with decades of innovation and all the fundamental technology research and such. And now Apple just comes and copycats their wireless tech? Get the popcorn ready for even more patent lawsuits. What a stupid move. They should focus on their tech that is only going downhill and is full with: https://twitter.com/search?q=p...
I hope Apple stops the practice of putting GPS only in Cellular iPads while it is redesigning the modems.
Most Android tablets that are WIFI only have GPS.
Likely. Nomen est omen ?